Woman who has never felt pain hopes scientists can study her DNA to help others

Read story transcript

Jo Cameron has a rare genetic mutation that means she has never felt pain or stress — even when she gave birth to her two children.

"I was told [to] take everything that's going, every painkiller you can get, because it's going to be excruciating," said Cameron, a caregiver who lives in Inverness, Scotland.

"But I went into childbirth and I felt stretching feelings in my body, and the child moving as you obviously expect, but at no point did I feel pain."

Now 71, Cameron's unique DNA has made her the subject of a recently published study in the British Journal of Anaesthesia, which revealed that she has two mutations that simultaneously suppress pain and anxiety and encourage happiness, wound healing and memory loss.

She spoke to The Current's guest host Piya Chattopadhyay about living a life without pain, and how she hopes scientists studying her condition can find a way to help others.

Do you feel lucky to not be able to experience pain or have anxiety?

Well, I'm lucky in that way. Growing up, I just thought I must be very healthy but very clumsy, because I used to have bumps and cuts on me ... and hadn't realized. I'd get undressed and find I'd harmed myself but no pain.

But looking back now in retrospect, I'm damaging myself all the time.

Obviously, pain is there to warn you of something, and I don't have the warning. So I'm lucky in many ways but I've got to be very careful because it can be dangerous.

So are you like the type of person, like I could turn on the stove at your house, hot burner, and say, 'Jo put your hand on that' and you wouldn't feel it, how hot it is?

Frequently ...I put my arm down on to the hotplate and don't realize until I start smelling flesh burning. And I'm vegan so there isn't much flesh burning in my home — it's only me.

I hand hot pots to people and they go 'ooh!'

Once they began studying you, what did they find Jo?

We all have something called anandamide in our body and that's why ... everyone can cope with pain up to a certain point. This is a pain inhibitor.

Well, they found I'd got seven times more of this pain inhibitor than anybody else.

But then they also found a gene deletion, which they hadn't found anywhere else, which they think is what makes me different. You know, some people can feel just small amounts of pain, but not no pain at all. But this deletion is the thing that makes it different.

Frequently ... I put my arm down on to the hotplate and don't realize until I start smelling flesh burning.- Jo Cameron

So you have something quite rare — do you know how rare the mutations that you have are?

Well, so far there's supposed to be a man in Colombia. That hasn't been verified, but they think it's the same. But apparently, probably just two of us at the moment.

But since I went public … 80 people worldwide have come forward [who] think they are the same. So testing's going to start on these 80 people.

I don't honestly believe I am the only person in the world. I think I am the only person who has been found, you know, discovered. It can't just be me.

What is your sort of understanding of pain?

Well, you only have to look at the face of someone in pain. And you see pictures or you go to a hospital and see people sitting in waiting rooms and their faces all screwed up. You can see the tension.

I worked with people with severe and profound physical and learning difficulties, and I worked with people who you could tell by ... the way they flinched when you touch them. Something made them screw their faces up and look really in agony, so I can appreciate that.

Has your husband and others you surround yourself with become more hyper... I don't know, protective of you, since you've been discovered?

My husband looks after me the whole time, he'll say, 'Watch now, be careful doing this.' And my daughter, especially, you know, she's constantly protective of me.

I think it's quite funny I really do: the carer being cared for.

The reason you've come forward, been public about this, is because you think there are others like you in the world ... and that we can study more of you. What do you hope, Jo, that people will learn from your experience?

I'm just praying there are more people. Because it's gene therapy they want to work on, so the more people they can find with the gene deletion I've got, the more chance of them finding a way of helping people.

Click 'listen' near the top of this page to hear the full conversation.

Written by Padraig Moran. Produced by Imogen Birchard.