Earwax, aka cerumen, even though it's ignored more than other topics is quickly becoming a valuable diagnostic tool. Alzheimer's, cancer, heart disease, and some metabolic disorders like type 2 diabetes can all be indicated by earwax, but wait there's more! There are two types of earwax, wet which is the orangish, sticky kind found in people of European or African descent though 95% of people of Asian descent have dry earwax which is gray and not sticky. The importance of this distinction is that most of the people with gray earwax are considerably less likely to get breast cancer because of the gene that makes the wax gray also inhibits cancer. One more interesting earwax fact for the day...earwax moves through the ear canal at the rate of one 20th of a millimeter everyday making it nearly impossible to get a ticket for speeding.
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