

The moral and ethical complexity of genetic research - siganakis
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-14/college-or-funeral-is-mother-s-wish-denied-on-dna-results.html

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siganakis
I think that there is a feeling in the community among many people that all
genetic information should be freely available, which at this stage I feel is
wrong. When people go to a doctor, they expect answers, and the reality is
that in many cases the researchers just don't know. This technology is so new,
relatively unproven and potentially dangerous that circumstances such as the
one you describe are likely to continue to arise.

An interesting thought experiment would be, what if Mr Lyons had been wrong,
and had claimed that the fetus was carrying the mutation when he was not? What
if the test had been compromised and he had told the Mrs Grondahl that her
child was going to be sick when she wasn't?

In this type of new research, the chances of the researcher getting it wrong
are very high. It takes years for people to truly understand the complex
nature of disease and its interaction with DNA.

With this type of research, I feel that we are going to see a number of
incidences where the researchers do in fact get it wrong, and do a lot of
damage by being cavalier with their findings.

Medical research moves slowly for a reason.

