Making rules in a world of exceptions

When we see a doctor, we expect to get - by and large - the right treatment for us. In this talk, I will argue that this is not necessarily the case and that having any working drugs is a minor miracle, because, frankly, free-living people are a nightmare for all their individuality. I will then look at how we can use individuality to improve treatment. 

One source of our individuality may be found in tissue antigens -- individually distinct markers, which trigger the immune rejection of transplants from other people. Yet transplantation does not occur in nature, so how could tissue antigens evolve their individuality? As I shall explain, we think the uniqueness of our tissue antigens benefits us in our continuous arms race against infectious agents, albeit at a cost: tissue antigens are risk factors for a long list of immune-related diseases.