In a previous post (“Clarifying misuse of Science“) I expressed concerns over Prenatal testing for familial hypercholesterolemia. Now it seems I should have included two more (and in my mind, – more controversial) tests approved in the UK for preimplantation testing preceding IVF. These are tests for breast cancer (BRCA1) and early onset Alzheimer.

I must have been naive to oppose the slippery slope argument in genetic testing discussions up until now. I wish we could restrain ourselves a bit more, but fear that we can’t. Why haven’t there been more fuzz around this ? Is everyone going to switch to using prestested eggs in IVF now ?

A (tricky) solution is to come up with treatments for most of these conditions, – looks like that needs to happen fast if we’re to avoid the brave new world future that critics of the genetics era have been promoting …..

The “find a cure” process of course, is not going to be fast and in the 10-25 years to follow, those concerned couples that have this option will most likely not take the chance that a treatment will be found in time for their child to be cured, and opt for the safer pretested egg and IVF.