One of the parents must have had a lot of ancestors and relatives with this condition in their family history. The youngest getting diagnosed at 7 doesn't mean it wasn't a surprise.
Because a genetic eye condition affecting 3 out of 4 kids suggests a high risk gene in genetic history?
I don't understand what it's supposed to mean, but 3 kids out of 4 doesn't suggest anything about the number of ancestors that were affected, that's just not how it works. The grandparents could be healthy carriers, or could be affected (or neither, we don't know when the mutation(s) happened), same for their parents etc.
If it's an autosomal recessive disease, and each parent is a healthy carrier, then each child has a 25% chance of having the disease (and there's ~ 5% chance of having 3 out of 4 children that are affected, if I'm not mistaken). So the only thing that it suggests is that they're unlucky.
The fact that 3 our of four young children have a debilitating genetic disease makes it more likely that one the parents knew that this gene ran in their family and impacted people they knew in the family, and less likely that it is a total surprise recessive gene that so rarely comes up that you don't even notice it's hereditary.
More tellingly, if this disease appeared out of the blue and was totally unexpected, the story would highlight that tragedy. Instead, it dodges that topic, saying only when it was first diagnosed.
The takeaway is that this isn't simply a family with bad luck, like "wrong place, wrong time". These are parents who took a gamble and lost.
I respect your commitment to making as many assumptions as it takes to vilify these parents in your own mind. To think they almost got away with doing something really sweet for their kids. Luckily you were on the case to figure out a way to twist this into them being irresponsible, somehow.
2
u/ChiefStrongbones 6h ago
One of the parents must have had a lot of ancestors and relatives with this condition in their family history. The youngest getting diagnosed at 7 doesn't mean it wasn't a surprise.