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You are looking at a genetic anomaly that might help decode cancer.

There are only about 840 people in the world with Laron syndrome. A significant cluster lives in southern Ecuador. Their bodies cannot process growth hormone, keeping them under four feet tall.

For more than twenty years, researchers tracked 100 of them. In that entire time, they recorded zero cases of diabetes and only a single, nonfatal case of cancer. Among their relatives of average height living in the exact same towns, 17% got cancer and 5% developed diabetes.

Scientists think the answer is a specific growth factor called IGF-1. People with Laron syndrome produce very little of it. In normal amounts, IGF-1 helps cells survive. In excess, researchers suspect it might help damaged cells ignore their programmed death cycle, allowing them to multiply.

Without it, cancerous cells simply cannot gain a foothold.

The goal is not to somehow recreate the syndrome. It is to find a drug or diet that safely suppresses IGF-1 just enough to replicate the shield.