Don't Take Liberties with Our Genes.

• Author: Bereano, Phil

"The Human Gene Project at the National Institutes of Health, also being supported in universities all across America, will one day in the not-too-distant future enable every set of parents that has a little baby to get a map of the genetic structure of their child. So if their child has a predisposition to a certain kind of illness or a certain kind of problem, or even to heart disease or stroke in the early 40's, they will be able to plan that child's life, that child's upbringing, to minimize the possibility of the child developing that illness or that predisposition, to organize the diet plan, the exercise plan, the medical treatment that would enable untold numbers of people to have far more full lives than would have been the case before..."

Bill Clinton's picture of a wonderful technofuture sounds like a threatening Brave New World to many Americans. The confluence of a number of technical and social trends has greatly enhanced the capacity for genetic surveillance and tracking:

* The science of genetics is a flourishing new industry, nourished in large part by the federally funded Human Genome Project. The goal of this ambitious research endeavor is to identify every gene found in the human body, approximately 100,000 in all. Much of the research focuses on genetic diagnostics: tests designed to identify genes thought to be associated with various medical conditions. More than 50 new genetic tests have been identified in the past five years alone.

* The increasing speed, sophistication, affordability, and interconnectivity of computer systems allows the rapid monitoring and matching of many millions of records.

* The promotion of an ideology of geneticization fosters the belief that genes are determinative of an individual's behavior, character, and future. In the words of Nobelist Jim Watson, "We used to believe our destiny was in the stars; now we know it is in our genes." The critical role of environment, and the complex interplay between a genome and its surroundings, is largely ignored in the media and public discourse about genetics.

* Capitalist economic relations have created a mad scramble for venture capital, the altering of patent laws, and calls for mass genetic testing by researchers who trade on the old image of the altruistic scientist to mask their conflicts of interest in testing labs, patents, consulting contracts, etc.

The United States is a society in which the differential access to wealth and power has been...