Royals and other people of privilege were said to have "blue blood." Where did this terminology come from? Some say that when they were pinched, their skin turned blueish. Or that, with their pale complexions, their veins looked blue.
Sometimes, very rarely, there is less hemoglobin in the blood when the condition of methaemoglobinaemia occurs. This can be genetic or acquired (by ingesting a toxin). The "blue people of Kentucky" suffered from this condition. They appeared blue, especially when angry, cold, or stressed. "The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek" is a fictional story of one of the blue people, by Kim Michele Richardson. It chronicles the story of a woman named Cussy Mary, who was named after the French village of Cussy where her grandfather was born. He was modeled on Martin Fugate, a French immigrant who inadvertently married a woman who also carried the recessive gene for methaemoglobinaemia. Four of their seven children had blue-tinged skin.
The condition can be ameliorated with a tablet or injection. And sometimes it goes away on its own. But having a blue appearance can have its drawbacks, as the book tells in the story of Cussy and her family. She was a courageous woman, riding over the rugged mountainous countryside on her donkey, bringing books to the isolated people.
We owe much to another blue-blooded creature, the horseshoe crab. It has a copper-based circulatory system, rather than iron. A remarkable property in its blood causes clotting in the presence of bacterial toxins. Because of this, anything that has to be sterile is usually tested in horseshoe crab blood before it is used on humans. Vaccines, implants, needles, prostheses. . . we must thank the horseshoe crab for the use of these life-saving technologies.
The animal doesn't need to be killed to harvest its blood. It can be returned to the ocean to resume living its life. But studies have shown that the crabs lay fewer eggs after being bled and are less active. If the animals are harvested roughly, that can also cause stress. In some states, crabs are not required to be rehomed. They are used for bait or simply discarded. Since they are essentially a small amount of flesh surrounded by a hard shell, they aren't often eaten. But, considering how valuable they are to humans, they deserve a better life. Fortunately a synthetic version of horseshoe crab blood has been developed. Now, if the medical industry would only adopt it more.
Read more about blue blood here:
https://theconversation.com/why-you-really-wouldnt-want-to-have-blue-blood-180360
and more about the bleeding of horseshoe crabs here:
https://www.npr.org/2023/06/10/1180761446/coastal-biomedical-labs-are-bleeding-more-horseshoe-crabs-with-little-accountabi
Caution! There is a photo of horseshoe crabs being bled in this story that may be upsetting.
Photo of horseshoe crab courtesy of PBS.
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