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New Bill Would Allow Employers To Demand Genetic Testing From Workers (businessinsider.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the turn-your-head-and-cough dept.

capedgirardeau quotes a report from Business Insider: A little-noticed bill moving through the U.S. Congress would allow companies to require employees to undergo genetic testing or risk paying a penalty of thousands of dollars, and would let employers see that genetic and other health information. Giving employers such power is now prohibited by U.S. law, including the 2008 genetic privacy and nondiscrimination law known as GINA. The new bill gets around that landmark law by stating explicitly that GINA and other protections do not apply when genetic tests are part of a "workplace wellness" program. The bill, HR 1313, was approved by a House committee on Wednesday, with all 22 Republicans supporting it and all 17 Democrats opposed. The 2008 genetic law prohibits a group health plan -- the kind employers have -- from asking, let alone requiring, someone to undergo a genetic test. It also prohibits that specifically for "underwriting purposes," which is where wellness programs come in. "Underwriting purposes" includes basing insurance deductibles, rebates, rewards, or other financial incentives on completing a health risk assessment or health screenings. In addition, any genetic information can be provided to the employer only in a de-identified, aggregated form, rather than in a way that reveals which individual has which genetic profile. There is a big exception, however: As long as employers make providing genetic information "voluntary," they can ask employees for it. Under the House bill, none of the protections for health and genetic information provided by GINA or the disabilities law would apply to workplace wellness programs as long as they complied with the ACA's very limited requirements for the programs. As a result, employers could demand that employees undergo genetic testing and health screenings.

3 of 397 comments (clear)

  1. Gattaca by Stephenmg · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So we will soon have Gattaca? https://www.themoviedb.org/mov...

    1. Re:Gattaca by Freischutz · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You can't fix social mobility with IQ tests. Hell you can't fix ANYTHING with IQ tests.

      My cousin was sent to a special needs class which in Germany at the time effectively destroyed any hope you had of ever getting into a University. This was done on the basis of an analysis of his grades and an IQ test. He ended up being sent to a vocational school and graduated as a plumber because the specialists in classifying humans by IQ declared that with his limited intelligence a lowly plumber was the most he could ever hope to aspire to. He eventually escaped this system of human quality classification after he graduated by completing a business degree at a private school. He now owns a big plumbing company and by big I mean the kind of company that bids for substantial contracts like doing the plumbing large office buildings and factories. I have seen enough similar examples for me to conclude that IQ tests are at best an extremely inaccurate instrument and at worst completely useless.

  2. get rid of employer health plans by ooloorie · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The biggest problem with the US health insurance is the way it's tied to employment: it means that people end up in weird employment-based risk pools, that they lose health care when they lose their jobs, and that people don't get the same kind of tax breaks when insured on their own.

    There are plenty of the proverbially "advanced nations" that have private health care instead of "single payer"; however, they usually have private health plans that aren't tied to employers. That's what Congress should fix, first by giving individuals the same kind of tax breaks as employers for health plans, and then by gradually phasing out employer-based health plans altogether.