Doubles and multiples, making any passer-by double-take in amazement!
This was the experience of people one morning in December in the Mulleriyawa town as hundreds of twins and "multiples" such as triplets converged at the NCEF Buddhist College for a cultural festival organized by the Sri Lankan Twin Registry.
"We get sick at the same time," laughs eight-year-old K. Tharani Bodhini while twin K. Dasuni Bodhini nods in agreement. They have come for the festival titled 'Art for scientific research' to sing, dance, paint, write essays and mingle with others of their kind and were busy putting on make-up, while their grandmother said it is very difficult to distinguish one from the other.
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| Akinda and Akithmi with their parents. |
Sixty-four-year-old J. Ranjith W. Jayasekera has come alone, for his twin brother is not well. "When we were babies, our mother didn't know which one she had breastfed and sometimes one got double doses of milk," he says, adding that in desperation their parents put chains of different colours around their necks.
Ranjith lives in Gampaha and his brother, Lakshman in Piliyandala but whenever one or the other is sick they instinctively know and call. "When he is sick I feel a need to speak to him," says Ranjith.
There was absolutely no difference when they were born, says Renuka Damayanthi of her four-year-old triplets, Vihansa Mihindi, Nadinsa Sanindi and Dulansa Nevindi, explaining that one just had a spots on her nose.
Having first heard that she was expecting twins and learning much later that it was triplets, it came as a "huge surprise" for them, she says, adding that they tied thread of three colours on their wrists to identify them. Otherwise giving milk and medicines posed a problem.
They bond closely, she says, adding that whenever she becomes firm with one triplet, the others come to her aid, especially at tooth-brushing time.
For Lionel and Ganga Wijegunasinghe it was a double bonus when they had Akinda Damsath and Akithmi Dahamna, now four years old, because they were childless for 16 years.
The cultural festival with 500 participants was organized by the Twin Registry which functions under the Institute for Research and Development and has 33,000 twins and multiples registered with it. But this was the fulfilment of only just a small part of its mandate.
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| J. Ranjith W. Jayasekera |
Set up in 1997, as a volunteer register, it gained momentum with 9,204 twins responding to advertisements in the early stages. It has come a long way since then, undertaking interesting research on the fascinating aspects of the lives of twins and multiples.
One major study is common mental disorders among twins, says Physician and Endocrinologist Dr. Sisira Siribaddana who is Programme Leader for the Twin Registry.
"This study is unusual," explains Dr. Siribaddana, pointing out that it was based on a true population sample, it took place in a developing country, with a population experiencing wide disparities of environmental risk factors and it sought to measure these risk factors directly, instead of relying only on the equal environments assumption.
Under the theme 'Genetic and environmental contributions to depression in Sri Lanka' which considered heritability of depression in the first large population-based twin study in a low-income country, the research had focused on lifetime depression and a broader measure of depression susceptibility among 3,908 adult twins in the Colombo district.
"There were gender differences for the broader definition, with a higher genetic contribution in women (61%) than men (4%). The results were similar for depression but prevalence was too low to estimate heritability for males," says Dr. Siribaddana.
The conclusion, the Sunday Times learns was that in women the genetic contribution to depression is higher than in men, while the environment played a bigger role in depression among men.
Poverty was one of the environmental factors that contributed to depression among men, Dr. Siribaddana points out, explaining that the nature as well as the magnitude of environmental influences may also differ across populations. "Early school-leaving and standard of living showed environmentally-mediated effects on depression in men while in women life events like a death influenced depression partly through genetic pathways."
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| Tharani and Dasuni |
When considering fatigue, Dr. Siribaddana said that there were environmentally mediated effects (through early school leaving and life events) and strong suggestions of family-environmental influences.
The important aspects of nicotine and alcohol use that had been studied under another survey of a population-based sample including 1,804 men had found that less than one-third of the male twins (32%) were lifetime smokers. Nicotine-use traits were significantly heritable (average heritability = 56%) with no evidence of a significant contribution of shared environmental effects (average shared environment = 10%), it is learnt.
However, these results on nicotine use may not apply to adolescents, said Dr. Siribaddana.
Meanwhile, more than half of the male twins reported life-time alcohol consumption but the prevalence of frequent and heavy drinking and associated problems were lower than in previously investigated western populations.
"Most alcohol use traits were significantly heritable with no evidence for a significant contribution of shared environmental effects," explained Dr. Siribaddana, adding that there was a moderate link between life-time drinking and smoking, mostly explained by shared environmental factors.
With many more researches planned for the future, the Twin Registry is hoping to organize another fun-filled day as the second round of 'Art for scientific research' to be held at the Janakala Kendraya at Pelawatte, Battaramulla on February 6. |
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