Vitiligo

Vitiligo is an autoimmune disease that arises when the cells of the body that produce melanin stop functioning correctly. It causes one’s skin to develop white patches. While vitiligo can technically be described as a disease, it’s not medically dangerous. It can affect one’s appearance, but it’s not life-threatening or contagious.

Vitiligo is different from albinism because the latter is a genetic disorder that affects one’s entire body. The Jamaican-Canadian TV personality Winnie Harlow has vitiligo and spoke about her experience with the disease in a TEDx presentation and a viral YouTube video.

Syndactyly

Most people call it webbed toes, but this rare condition is also known by an appropriate medical term: syndactyly. It occurs while babies are still in their mother’s womb because the child’s toes or fingers failed to separate. Often associated with toes, syndactyly is more common as a condition that affects one’s fingers.

Syndactyly doesn’t cause any harm and can easily be solved. However, it can also be related to serious genetic conditions such as Down syndrome. It’s also associated with a rare autosomal recessive congenital disorder known as Sakati syndrome.

Synophrys

We all know it as unibrow, but the medical dictionary calls it synophrys. Synophrys can be described as the fusion of the eyebrows above the nose and is caused by a mutation in a specific gene, namely the SMC1A gene. It is such a mild condition that it can be easily solved with a razor!

While synophrys was once considered unfashionable, it has since become a symbol of style. One of the people who has helped promote the unibrow look is the Greek-Cypriot model Sophia Hadjipanteli, who redefines beauty standards and counts over 466K followers on Instagram.