Talk

All the press and the genetics community are chattering about the almost simultaneous launch of deCODEme and 23andMe’s services a week or so ago. On my previous post, Ramunas asked me whether companies like these pose a threat to the condition-oriented testing and services that DNA Direct offers. On the contrary, I think quite the opposite. Here’s my response:

The press that these new companies are receiving is increasing people’s general awareness of genetics, risk and health. Many people may not be interested in these SNP scans, but the awareness might drive them to more significant risk issues that they are worried about — such as a cancer risk, or blood clotting risk, that’s based on personal and family history.

Also, these new companies have explicitly stated that their test results are not meant to be used as medical information. People who want to do so may need follow-on testing — to confirm a risk, to provide screening, to provide diagnosis, etc. For these people, clinical consulting services that can explaining someone’s genotype in context of their personal history, family medical history, and lifestyle and environmental factors will be what makes all this testing useful and not just noise. That’s where companies like DNA Direct come in.

Over at Eye on DNA, Hsien has a very useful and neutral perspective on the new companies for people interested in these new “genome scans” and the companies that offer them. Her post also has comments worth checking out and will point you to the best DNA bloggers’ posts on the subject: DNA Network Members Discuss Personal Genomes Services

Since a key component of 23andME and deCODEme’s services is ancestry and geneology, I’ve been particularly interested in how these services will compare to the many established ancestry testing services (and more importantly, their databases which make the results meaningful). So, I was particularly interested in Blaine’s perspective at The Genetic Genealogist.

As for the mainstream media’s commentary, I’ll post a round-up tomorrow.

Technorati Tags: 23andme, decodeme, navigenics, personal genome services, genome wide arrays

This entry was posted on Monday, November 26th, 2007 at 1:42 pm and is filed under Personal Genome Services. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.