Two-year-old Zainab Mughal seems like any toddler with her huge smile and love of toys. But the South Florida girl with the chubby cheeks and big, bright eyes has lost her curls and is now bald, as she bravely battles an aggressive childhood cancer. This month, her parents launched a desperate international appeal and search for blood donors with a rare genetic variation.
The American not-for-profit community organisation, OneBlood.org is leading the online drive to locate the only people who are likely to be a match for Zainab (www.oneblood.org/zainab/). Statistically, these are donors of blood type “O” or “A” and exclusively of Pakistani, Indian or Iranian descent. Few are like Zainab, missing a common antigen that most people carry on their red blood cells, called “Indian B” (Inb), so named because an estimated 4% of Indians possess it.
Antigens are either sugars in the case of the ABO blood group, or proteins in the other major blood band termed “Rh,” that prompt the production of antibodies in the human body. The surviving term “Rh” was originally a misnomer abbreviation of “Rhesus factor” erroneously believed to be similar to the surface marker found in rhesus monkey red blood cells.
