Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- I Legal Implications of Medical Advances
- 1 The Genomics Revolution in the Shadow of Auschwitz: Eugenics, Genism, and Genetic Genocide
- 2 Human Genetic Engineering and the Problems of Distributive Justice
- 3 Genetic Testing – Present and Future Problems
- 4 What Is So Unfair about Using Genetic Information? The Problem of Genetic Discrimination
- II Evolutionary Approach to the Normativity of Law
- III Appendix
- About the Authors
4 - What Is So Unfair about Using Genetic Information? The Problem of Genetic Discrimination
from I - Legal Implications of Medical Advances
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- I Legal Implications of Medical Advances
- 1 The Genomics Revolution in the Shadow of Auschwitz: Eugenics, Genism, and Genetic Genocide
- 2 Human Genetic Engineering and the Problems of Distributive Justice
- 3 Genetic Testing – Present and Future Problems
- 4 What Is So Unfair about Using Genetic Information? The Problem of Genetic Discrimination
- II Evolutionary Approach to the Normativity of Law
- III Appendix
- About the Authors
Summary
New discoveries in human genetic technology have a significant impact on society and open up new perspectives in medicine. Genetic information provides the ability to diagnose or predict genetic conditions for the risks of illness and may bring about significant benefits to health care in the future. However, the use of genetic information poses daunting questions and great challenges to public health care and our legal systems. One of the most demanding issues of the integration of new genetic technologies into medicine is the challenge of equality. The second biggest issue is the problem of the protection of patients' autonomy and privacy in the age of genomic medicine, especially when genetic information can be used and misused for miscellaneous purposes. Both of the above mentioned concerns are based on a common social fear – the fear of genetic discrimination that has stimulated legislators of many countries to pass special laws guaranteeing genetic privacy or preventing people from genetic discrimination in such fields as the insurance system and employment.
In the present essay I shall discuss some of the issues concerned with the problem of genetic discrimination. I shall present what genetic discrimination means and how it can manifest itself. I shall also discuss the main controversies that arise when the law preventing genetic discrimination is at stake.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Studies in the Philosophy of LawLaw and Biology, pp. 53 - 72Publisher: Jagiellonian University PressPrint publication year: 2010