Genomic Testing And Ethical Dilemma

   The Human Genome Project is the largest scientific endeavor undertaken since the Manhattan Project, and, as with the Manhattan Project, the completion of the Human Genome Project has brought to surface many moral and ethical issues concerning the use of the knowledge gained from the project. Although genetic tests for certain diseases have been available for 15 years (Ridley, 1999), the completion of the Human Genome Project will certainly lead to an exponential increase in the number of genetic tests available. Therefore, before genetic testing becomes a routine part of a visit to a doctor's office, the two main questions at the heart of the controversy surrounding genetic testing must be

As you can see genetic testing is very important and can affect a child's and parents lives for the better and the worst. Children all over the world have serious genetic diseases that affect their life on a daily. Some of these diseases are Achondroplasia, Down syndrome, and Turner's syndrome. Many believe genetic testing is a good way to test for these genetic conditions before the child is even born, but others think that it can harm the baby very badly and even cause a miscarriage, so they choose not to do this kind of testing. Knowing about the most serious genetic diseases is very important for expecting parents to be informed as well as being

The benefits of genetic science for society is for employers who want to know if their employers are in excellent working condition and if the worker will cause them more money when obtaining health insurance. If an employer hires someone that that is healthy then the cost of health insurance does not rise and the employee will not have to downgrade their health insurance plan so that they can accommodate the employee that is not healthy. The limitations of genetic science for society are the possibility of genetic testing causing safety issues at work, the development of a genetic low class, the breach of privilege and confidentiality, and the utilization of genetic bias to excuse different methods of discrimination (Krumm, 2002).

Genetic testing has brought about many changes in the way many couples look at conceiving and raising families. Through genetic testing you are able to screen for the increased chance that a fetus may have one of many congenital disorders, or even identify gene changes that are responsible for a disease that has already been diagnosed (Genetic Testing, March 2015). Unfortunately genetic testing is not always exact, in some cases giving parents false negatives or false positive results. Even if the results are accurate, there is the burden of knowledge once you know the results indicate a genetic abnormality such as Down’s syndrome. While caring for a 2 year old male patient with developmental delays and anotia, I learned that genetic testing had been started but never completed on the child. Genetic testing could help to identify genetic disorders that led to the child’s developmental delays and possible future disorders that may develop. The ethical dilemma I will be discussing to the ANA Ethical dilemma of the impact of informed consent of genetic testing on children for adult onset diseases and disorders.

Genetic testing has become a highly controversial issue among both the general population and the scientific community. It is a process that exposes a person’s entire genome sequence, allowing it to be read and evaluated to identify potential risks for genetic diseases or diseases that could be passed onto offspring (Holt Productions, 2012). With thousands of genetic tests already being used, and more being established, it seems logical to put this growing technology to use. Some agree that it is a person’s right to know and understand his or her genetic makeup. However, others argue that, despite the benefits of genetic testing, caution should be used to carefully inspect the risks associated with this new technology.

As time goes on civilizations find innovations to make living a little bit easier. However, new frontiers often bring struggles. In Flackelmann’s articles on “ The Ethics of DNA Testing” four situations are given and later followed by a comprehensive analysis by both the public and by experts in ethics, law, genetics and any other various fields that correlate with the cases’ scenarios. The first scenario (titled “ A Case of Dwarfism”) describes the story of a couple who are carrying the gene for achondroplasia, meaning they both are dwarfs. The counselor tells the parents that through genetic testing they can find out whether or not the child will have dwarfism as well. The couple has made 3 decisions; the first being that if the child has

The distress and the health risk to the mother are concerns when viewed through the lens of the principle of nonmaleficence or of “do no harm”. The accessibility and cost of the prenatal genetic testing are contentious. Although prenatal genetic testing is considered to be a useful tool, some believe it leads us down a “slippery slope”. Controversy exists surrounding prenatal genetic testing for reasons of social, psychological, moral, and religious rationales.

The Goal of the Human Genome Project is to obtain genetic mapping information and to determine the complete sequence of all human DNA by the year of 2005. The project started in 1990 and 180 million dollars are being spent on it annually. This adds up to a total of over 2 billion dollars for the 15 year budget. Of this 2 billion dollars budgeted, 5% is spent annually on the ethical, legal and social issues. This report focused on some of these issues.

The Human Genome Project introduces significant scientific findings to the world, but raises a lot of controversies. Many of these controversies concern the application of this new scientific finding and its ethicality. Genetic information from a project, once aimed towards mapping the human genome in hope for curing diseases, are now being used in businesses. It shouldn’t be permissible for employers to require that all employees, as well as potential employees, be screened for genetic vulnerabilities and to use the results of such screening when they make hiring, retention, and job assignment decisions. These genetic vulnerabilities may include diseases, unsuitable personality traits and other traits the company deems undesirable. Employees shouldn’t be judged by their genes, because the results do not adequately speak for what the employees will do in life, the employee’s position in the society, and the employee’s financial standing. Genetic testing should be an option for the employees to decide on job assignment rather than influence the hiring decisions of employers. Genetic testing only shows genetic potential, not potential growth. Conducting genetic testings on employees infringes on their privacy and encourage more social gaps with genetic classes.

I do not believe that “direct-to-consumer” genetic testing is wise, especially without the involvement of trained professionals or set guidelines. As mentioned in the prompt, some of the risks that I believe are important involve the ethical and social challenges direct-to-consumer testing can create as well as the complexity of certain genomic tests.

The opponents of genetic screening claim that genetic screening brings negative effect to the individual. For instance, Kelly Nicole and her teammates who focus on medical field point out, “A report showed that over 19 million people had their medical information breached since 2009. Fear of discrimination and lack of confidentiality is especially a concern when one considers the inconsistent regulations of dried blood spots storage and use” (236). The data from Kelly shows that genetic screening may leak personal information, increasing the personal social pressure. Although the information preservation system of genetic screening is not perfect. The benefit of genetic screening to the society is huge greater than the harmful

The positive outcome of genetic research are the potential benefits and the aspects of these why these can affect the current life and future life of people. An outstanding performance can affect everyone in a positive way. According to doctors in the article “Genetic Testing - Benefits, Costs, and Risks of Genetic Testing ; “ Research testing involves finding new genes, linking genes and genetic mutations to specific medical conditions, and finding out ,how genes work and affect individuals.” This represents on how new work, and involving new links of an individual process. It also mentions, finding these new genes can be helpful towards the work that needs to be done in a progressing manner . A negative test result of a negative matter

genetic testing, everything has changed. She notes that clinicians now have the ability to diagnose, treat, and monitor a patient’s illnesses or disease progression in an entirely different manner. This is a far cry from the old medical model of responding to a disease (or defect) only after it appears, and then prescribing the recommended medication or intervention. These genetic medical advances sound miraculous and promising, but the ability to test, screen and provide early intervention does not come without many major ethical dilemmas.

There are both pros and cons to genetic screening and the underlying question is. Is genetic screening an ethical solution to human life? A person who is having, carrying, or is at risk of a disorder is subject to genetic testing. Pre-natal diagnosis for a genetic condition is available in the case of diseases like Down's syndrome. The increasing range of genetic tests for an increasing range of disorders made possible by human genome research offers parents much greater informed choice of whether or not to continue with a pregnancy. Pre-natal diagnosis have a major effect on individuals and their families with a history of a genetic disorder. Known genetic traits or conditions (such as colour blindness) have been screened for many years.

The ability to predict disease and one’s health status by means of genetic testing has raised ethical and legal issues and risks in medicine, public health and social policy. Ethical issues are common in all branches of medicine but “human genetics poses particular challenges and risks because genetic identity or information affect not only an individual, but also affect family members, close relatives, extended family and as well as the society in general” (Turnpenny and Ellard 2012. p. 361). There have been a lot of discussions about the availability of genetic information in terms of confidentiality, privacy, the moral acceptability of disclosure and the right not to know. For example genetic information of future people also can be obtained and stored. Question aroused that how privacy can deal with this. Everyone involved in clinical genetics will be facing complex and challenging ethical situations which can result in difficult problems that cause depression. The examples of ethical issue or risks are discrimination by insurers, employers, schools and colleagues, stigmatization, psychological distress and harm, use of unproven medical therapies or use of proven but unnecessary medical therapies, misinterpretation and misuse of the genetic test and testing errors. There are cases of people being treated unfairly because of their genotype as a result of the genetic test result has leaked to third parties such as employers and health insurers. Therefore, four legal and