Progeria

Progeria is one of the rarest and at the same time most shattering diseases a human body can carry. A child comes into the world, seemingly healthy, and after just a few months begins to age at a pace that turns all biological logic on its head. The skin grows thin, the hair falls out, the joints stiffen, the heart tires. A child of eight bears the signs of a body that has lived eighty years. And yet inside is a child — with the wishes, the curiosity, the joy of play of a child.

Medicine today knows precisely what happens: a single mutation in the LMNA gene causes a faulty protein — progerin — to destabilise cell nuclei. The cells age as though an internal timekeeper were running at frantic speed. That is the biochemical truth, and it is undeniable. But it is not the whole truth.