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Vice Blog

SCANDINAVIA - BIONIC INBREDS

A recent study has found that people in Lapland don't feel pain. It started when an orthopaedist working in Sápmi witnessed locals laughing off traumatic injuries. He saw a young boy fall two stories without whining. Then he saw a girl fall off a wall and just get up and brush herself off, even though her arm was sliced up like bacon.

A subsequent study identified a condition called 'Hereditary Lapland Pain-Insensitivity'. It is caused by a genetic mutation that fucks up the nerve endings and is often seen in communities were inbreeding is common. We called up a guy we know who's always getting in the most brutal bar fights and asked him what he knew about it…

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VICE: Have you heard about the Hereditary Lapland Pain-Insensitivity?

Tough guy: No, but I'm from up there, and we're all extremely resilient. I used to work as a mailman, and during the winter it would be –35°C and blizzards. It was two hours of hell. You just have to toughen it out. Frostbite is no biggie.

VICE: So you think it's more of a mind-set then a DNA thing?

Tough guy: The winters are pain. You just need learn how to toughen it out.

VICE: You have a high pain threshold, right? Are you ever afraid you'll injure yourself because you're so insensitive?

Tough guy: It's not so much that I'm afraid, as I am counting on it. You can't be afraid of pain and get into a fight. That doesn't work. I guess it's adrenalin too. But when I'm fighting I don't feel a thing.

VICE: Do you know anyone else with a high pain threshold?

Tough guy: My mum. She's from even further up north, and she don't feel a thing. She doesn't even think giving birth is painful.