Suppose a genetic disease runs in your family. Scientists have just identified t
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Question
Suppose a genetic disease runs in your family. Scientists have just identified the gene responsible for the disease and have developed a way to test for it.1. Would you have the test done to see whether you carry that gene?
2. Consider both the advantages and disadvantages of having this information.
3. Describe how the treatment for serious diseases will improve as a result of information from the human genome project. For example, think about how drug therapy might improve and how gene therapy could be used. Drugs could be developed to target a specific disease, and possibly the genes could be modified.
4. Why do you think some people are opposed to the human genome project? Explain why. Suppose a genetic disease runs in your family. Scientists have just identified the gene responsible for the disease and have developed a way to test for it.
1. Would you have the test done to see whether you carry that gene?
2. Consider both the advantages and disadvantages of having this information.
3. Describe how the treatment for serious diseases will improve as a result of information from the human genome project. For example, think about how drug therapy might improve and how gene therapy could be used. Drugs could be developed to target a specific disease, and possibly the genes could be modified.
4. Why do you think some people are opposed to the human genome project? Explain why. Suppose a genetic disease runs in your family. Scientists have just identified the gene responsible for the disease and have developed a way to test for it.
1. Would you have the test done to see whether you carry that gene?
2. Consider both the advantages and disadvantages of having this information.
3. Describe how the treatment for serious diseases will improve as a result of information from the human genome project. For example, think about how drug therapy might improve and how gene therapy could be used. Drugs could be developed to target a specific disease, and possibly the genes could be modified.
4. Why do you think some people are opposed to the human genome project? Explain why.
Explanation / Answer
Genetic testing uses laboratory techniques to study a person’s DNA to identify genetic differences or susceptibility to particular diseases.
1. Genetic tests can be done if you have developed any signs of a disease, to know whether you are at an increased risk of a disease, or you might want to know whether you might pass the disease to the next generation. Hence, for all these reasons genetic testing is good and can be done to see whether the gene responsible for that particular disease is present in you.
2. Genetic testing has advantages as well as disadvantages.
Advantages
Disadvantages
3. If you come to know from the information of the human genome project that a person is suffering from a serious illness, the treatment can be started immediately as early as possible. Genetic testing can be informative and help caregivers and patients to make safer decisions while choosing medications. Genetic testing before starting a medication for a serious illness is advisable, since when there is a well understood drug–gene interaction, and knowing the genotype before starting treatment can avoid potential dangerous side effects. Apart from this, by gene testing if you come to know how a patient will respond to a drug, it can save time and quality of life. This is particularly useful while treatment of illnesses like cystic fibrosis and cancer. Through genetic testing, efficient drug therapy can be done which enables to match the right drug to the right person. Thus, specific drugs can be developed to target specific diseases causing potentially no harm to the body as whole.
Genetic testing also allows for gene therapy by using specific genes or modifying a particular gene to treat or prevent diseases. This method minimizes the use of drugs or a surgery and its after effects, and may also prolong the life of the individual. But this technique is risky and does not ensure safety and hence is currently being used only for diseases that have no other cures.
4. Human genome project helps in identifying the human genome – the sequence of nucleotide base pairs that make up the DNA.
Supporters of the project hail it as a means of eliminating disease, emotional disorders, and other forms of human suffering. But the risks and ethical dilemmas are overwhelming.
Opponents are of the view that humanity is entering a new, inevitable era in the use of technology to alter human life, which eventually might end up like ‘Victor Frankenstein’!
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