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Genetic Testing Coming To a Drugstore Near You
Hugh Pickens writes "The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Walgreens is slated to begin selling genetic-testing kits priced from $20 to $30 apiece that can tell people whether they're likely to get breast cancer, Alzheimer's disease, become obese, or suffer from a range of other maladies. However, to get the results of various tests, shoppers will have to fork over an additional $79 for drug-response results, $179 for 'pre-pregnancy planning' results, $179 for health condition results, or $249 for a combination of the three. Pathway Genomics and other companies already offer such tests online, but Walgreens will be the first brick-and-mortar retailer to sell them. FDA spokeswoman Karen Riley says Pathway overstepped its bounds when it announced its plans to market the tests directly to the consumer at 6,000 of Walgreen's 7,500 stores and wants Pathway Genomics to submit data showing that its tests give accurate results. 'The claims have limitations based on existing science,' says Riley, 'and consumers should not be making important medical and lifestyle decisions based on these tests without first consulting a health-care professional.' Walgreen responded that FDA clearance is not required to sell the kit in its stores; and anyway, the drugstore chain already sells other diagnostic and testing products such as pregnancy tests, paternity tests, and drug tests."
They gypsy certainly has better applied psych skills; but, for a great many genetic(or suspected but not yet fully elucidated) conditions, there is a way that is cheaper and more effective.
Family history.
With the exception of (not-nonexistent; but quite rare) conditions caused by a mutation or mutations that originated with you, not earlier in the line, or a fairly small number of well developed genetic tests, most of which you aren't going to get over the counter at CVS, you'll have a better chance of learning about the likely phenotypic consequences of your genes by looking at mommy and daddy, keeping their environment in mind(daddy's lung cancer probably doesn't count as "family history" if he was a chain-smoking asbestos miner, it probably does if he wasn't).
DNA sequencing has, certainly, gotten cheap enough that you might actually get a fairly accurate reading of a subset of your genome for a hundred bucks through the mail. However, I'd be quite surprised if, when it comes to predicting the consequences, which are what people actually care about, the method is going to outperform just looking at family history. In a lot of cases, the science simply isn't settled, at any price. Even where it is, you are going to be getting some mail merge algorithm, not a geneticist, or even a genetic counselor, for your hundred bucks.
This is just a diagnostics test. It won't kill anyone.
Hopefully you'll never be in the market for a blood sugar test kit.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
More dangerous would be something like you sending off a workmate's saliva to see if they have HIV and then using that information to force them out of a job, etc. That's the sort of casual mis-use that we *don't* need.
Why would you use a genetics test to test for HIV? While you can now test for HIV with saliva, Pathway Genomics does not check for HIV as it's not a genetically inherited disease. It can be passed from mother to offspring prior to or during birth but it's not inherit to the genetic material. These tests at Walgreens are not to check for HIV or AIDS.
if you are with someone "significant" who calls the whole thing off because of things like that, then you're much, much better off without them, surely?
Depends, relationships are all about compromise. You meet the perfect someone but they're a hypochondriac when it comes to cancer. Oh well, you can work past that until they get their hands on this test and demand you take it or, like I said, send in your sample without your consent. No one's perfect. Someone worrying now about their offspring's future is not a bad thing. The bad thing is proceeding without consent. Your fears, however, make absolutely no sense.
Someone with a genetically inherited disease working next to you does not pose a risk unless you plan on them becoming your father or mother.
My work here is dung.