Albinos in much of sub-Saharan Africa are in danger. Albinos lack the pigment melanin in their eyes, skin, and hair. It’s a genetic defect, but in much of Africa, it’s also reason for extreme, and deadly, prejudice. Phillip Martin has been reporting for our program on race and color around the world. This is the first of two stories Martin prepared on the growing threat to albinos. As one interviewee told him:
“I can tell you that throughout the whole area of Africa, beliefs exist that people with albinism are cursed, that the mother had sex with the white man, that she had sex with a European ghost, that these people are evil, that they’re possessed, that they’re substandard, that the disease is contagious. There’s a host of myths that prevail for hundreds of years for people with albinism in large parts of Africa.”
Listen to Part 1:
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