
Genomics and me: DNA testing may not reveal as much about yourself as you'd hope - jeremynicolas
http://thelongandshort.org/life-death/dna-testing-and-you
======
zeveb
> Two years ago, US consumers could see more than 240 detailed health and
> trait reports, including risk factors for heart attack and type 2 diabetes.
> Then, at the end of 2013, the Food and Drug Administration clamped down.
> They implied that 23andMe's tests were inaccurate. They also worried that
> some consumers would misconstrue the risks, seeking out unnecessary
> treatments and changing their medication regimes without speaking to their
> doctors.

I can't even begin to describe how much this enrages me: I, a purportedly-free
citizen of a purportedly-free republic, am not permitted to pay a firm to do
its best to give me accurate information, because some unelected third party
is concerned that I may make bad decisions based on that information.

What business of the State's is it if someone chooses to change his medical
regimen without consulting his physician? It's _his_ regiment, not the
State's; it's _his_ health, not the State's.

I'm a free man: I should be permitted to consult the best firms and
practitioners I can in order to make decisions for my own lifestyle.

~~~
devonEnlis
I think it's a complete tragedy that customers in the US can no longer get
health information from 23andMe.

I started a genome software company that primarily targets the academic
research market, but we recently adapted our software for 23andMe users:
[https://www.enlis.com/personal_edition.html](https://www.enlis.com/personal_edition.html)

Happy to hear opinions and bug reports!

~~~
sharvil
How does the report compare to the one generated by Promethease[1]?
Promethease itself uses data from SNPedia[2]

[1] [https://promethease.com/](https://promethease.com/)

[2]
[http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Promethease](http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Promethease)

------
copsarebastards
This brings up a number of problems with the current approaches to gathering
signal from the noise of DNA, but it's making the deeper argument that DNA may
not contain much useful information. I don't think it met the burden of proof
for that argument. It's a popular argument: we want to believe that our
attributes aren't predetermined, that we have free will, so we want to believe
anything that downplays the role of nature in the nature vs. nurture debate.
But really this is still a big unknown. I very much doubt that the
difficulties we currently have with gathering useful information from DNA are
unsolvable.

~~~
veritas3241
DNA is just a small part of what makes up the functioning whole of an
organism. The Transcriptome, Proteome, and the Metabolome are just as
important to determining the outcomes of genes.

It's like understanding what parts are in your car but not knowing how much
gas is in the tank, how far the pedal is pressed, or even what gear you're in.
It's still an incomplete picture.

Disclosure: I studied cancer metabolism in grad school so I'm a little biased
to think that the Metabolome is the functional endpoint of genetics and all
its associated modifiers.

~~~
copsarebastards
Well, in the nature vs. nurture debate I'm not really interested in taking a
side; I want to figure out the truth. I'm relatively certain that it's a
split. I just want to caution against a common human bias in favor of nurture,
which this article seems to be affected by.

------
dekhn
To anybody who has 23&Me results: can you tell me if they are still reporting
tongue rolling as a heritable trait on their reports?

~~~
SNPedia
Presumably you are aware this is a Myth of Human Genetics?

[http://snpedia.com/index.php/Myths_of_human_genetics](http://snpedia.com/index.php/Myths_of_human_genetics)

~~~
dekhn
Yes, I've read that paper, and I read 23&Me's blog post on the trait from 2008
([http://blog.23andme.com/23andme-and-you/tackling-tongue-
curl...](http://blog.23andme.com/23andme-and-you/tackling-tongue-curling-the-
challenge-of-23andwe/)). They both agree in saying that tongue rolling is not
a Mendelian trait, and they both agree there appears to be a heritable
component which affects several tongue-shaping traits.

I'm asking because the 23&Me reports don't really include the contextual
information to appreciate the subtlety of non-Mendelian traits. If people see
this and come to the false conclusion, then they're likely to come to similar
false conclusions abotu the parts of the report that touch on actual health-
related issues.

