DNA tests at home, ready for revolution?
2005/08/07 Rementeria Argote, Nagore - Elhuyar Zientziaren Komunikazioa
Decades have passed since the possibility of carrying out the pregnancy test at home (and without anyone knowing it) was opened. It helped the woman or couple plan their family, along with contraception methods, which led to enormous freedom.
Currently, a woman, to know if she is pregnant, has only bought a pregnancy test at the pharmacy: go home, read instructions and try. This is a couple of minutes. However, at first the urine sample was sent to a laboratory and the result was collected at home in a few days.
Well, DNA tests are also in this initial phase, as the sample (rubbing the mouth with a cotton swab or a drop of blood) should be sent. The request for the test can be made online and the result of the analysis is collected in the email, or in the mobile phone or post if preferred.
Laboratory inside the chip
In order to complete the entire process at home, all the steps taken in the laboratory must be done in a small kit. In Ikerlan, for example, we are working on it. They plan to introduce the ‘laboratory inside the chip’, that is, what is done in the laboratory at a microscopic scale, on a chip.
This chip, for example, would not only serve to detect diseases, but also to perform on-site DNA analyses necessary when a crime occurs. In short, it is a very small kit to perform a genetic analysis away from the laboratory. In this way, both at home and in the medical consultation, an analysis would be carried out and the results would be known shortly.
But, as has been said, for now, the analysis is done in the laboratory. And the companies that offer this service are increasingly numerous on the internet. They offer tests of different types: fertility related genes, lung and ovarian cancer, cystic fibrosis...
All evidence points to genetic analysis as an important prevention tool in the future. A tobacco smoker can help you become stronger in your attempt to quit smoking, such as the genetic risk of lung cancer. And with other diseases, it can also give strength to healthy habits in life.
However, genetics experts are concerned about whether the work of these companies is really professional and especially whether their relationship with the client is satisfactory, that is, whether they are adequately explained how to interpret the results obtained. Especially concerned are professionals accustomed to explaining genetic analyses to the public, as they know perfectly how discontented people tend to suffer from a disease
It is said that it is necessary to make it very clear that having this tendency does not mean that it will develop that disease, and on the contrary, although the result is negative, it is possible that one day that disease develops. The problem is that these tests study some genes related to certain diseases, but of course, the relationship is not biounivocal: it is known that there is more than one gene related to a disease and not all are known. Genetic research continues in its beginnings and, in addition, current knowledge is not definitive.
Destination in genes?
Moreover, the inheritance of genes related to some diseases does not ensure suffering. That is, destiny is not written in genes. This matter reminded several who remembered the film Gattaca, a world in which only genetically valid children were born.
Once the protagonist was born, after performing a genetic analysis and observing the risk of developing a series of ailments, they did not take it for granted, which determined the level of profession and responsibility of each person. But he faced the fate he had written in the genes and tried to fulfill his dream
In the future, will genetic analysis decide the place of each individual in society and in the world of work? It is not known. But it is possible. It would not be the first time that what was announced by science fiction was fulfilled. When it comes to sports, for example, it would serve to know which one is most suitable for each child, thus achieving better performance and a lower risk of injury.
Genetic analyses are already performed in sports. Players from the Sea Eagles rugby team in Sydney, for example, have received training tailored to their genetic characteristics. But, as experts say, we still don't know enough about genes and, in addition, the desire and effort that each puts don't come into genes.
Published in 7K.
