If the cells in our body are replaced every 7 to 10 years, why cant it roll itself back into a position where it worked better than it does now?

Question

For example: Someone has a disease, why cant the body just reset itself to how it was before it had the disease to get rid of the negative effects?

In: Biology

Answer 1

The body isn’t capable of going back to a previous version like computers can. Outside of it’s primary function, a cell’s only purpose is to create an exact copy of itself. This raises an issue. Each time a cell divides, it loses a small part of itself, specifically the telomeres, and eventually is no longer able to divide. This would tale place over a lifetime, until the individual has passed.

From what I understand, there’s a decent amount of research going into slowing down the decay of telomeres, but I’m pretty sure there hasn’t been any major breakthroughs. Any success would probably dominate global news for a while.