Haptoglobin Polymorphism among Brahmins of Himachal Pradesh, India

Haptoglobin, a plasma glycoprotein, binds free hemoglobin with high affinity and prevents the loss of iron from the body. Hence, haptoglobin plays an important role in protection of haemolytic disease by reducing the oxidative and peroxidative potential at free haemoglobin. The present study is concerned with the distribution of hemoglobin content and haptoglobin variants among the Brahmin, a caste endogamous community, of Solan District, Himachal Pradesh (India). In the present study, most of the peoples have normal hemoglobin content. When male and female are concerned individually, males are more anemic than the females. Hp gene was found to be polymorphic and population deviate from Hardy Weinberg Equilibrium (2=10.828, p>0.001) since there are significant differences in the expected and observed frequency distribution of Hp. The HP*2 allele was found with a very high frequency (0.97). This could possibly be due to angiogenic property of Hp2-2 type, lower risk of the HP2-2 phenotype compared to other phenotypes or it could be due to the possible selective advantage of the mutant HP*2 allele. Such high frequency of the mutant HP*2 allele observed needs to be probed into.