The Relationship Between Vitiligo and Race.

Vitiligo is a commonly acquired restrictive or generalized skin pigmentation loss disease. It is found all over the world and can be found in different nationalities and races, and the prevalence is higher in females than in males. According to the survey, the incidence of vitiligo in dark-skinned people can be as high as 4% (such as India), while lighter races are less than 1% (such as the United States and the United Kingdom), the difference between the incidence of the two is significant. So, why are dark-skinned people susceptible to vitiligo? The reason for this is not well understood. However, it may be different from the morphology of the synthesized mature melanosomes, therefore, melanin determines the higher chance of vitiligo in dark-skinned people.

The causes of melanin loss are mainly the following.

1. Light-skin melanosomes are relatively light, small, oval, and form a collection type distribution where several melanosomes wrapped together; On the other hand, dark-skin melanosomes are the contrary—dark brown, larger, spherical, and form a single type of distribution where melanosomes and presence separately.

2. When melanosomes are transferred from melanocytes to adjacent keratinocytes, melanosomes in light skin types are mainly found in the basal low layer of the epidermis and the spiny cell layer, while melanosomes can be seen in all layers of the epidermis in dark skin types, thus making it easy for melanin deficiency which will cause vitiligo.

There are many factors that trigger the onset of vitiligo, another factor is that the melanin anabolism of dark skin species may be more vigorous, if once given the activating factor-like ultraviolet light, melanin anabolism will be extremely vigorous, so it will accelerate the consumption of melanocytes; due to the vigorous melanin metabolism, the excessive accumulation of its intermediate products, in turn, can kill melanocytes, thus hindering the anabolism of melanocytes and results in depigmentation, which creates a great opportunity for the onset of vitiligo. The best way to prevent vitiligo is to protect your skin, and there are many ways to prevent vitiligo, patients should pay more attention to it.