Pay-to-play Genetics (Gattaca)

Many companies are now taking advantage of rapid advancements in genetic technology to offer (and heavily market) new services in reproductive healthcare. This episode will consider these recent developments alongside the 1997 film Gattaca. This film depicts a society with a genetics-based hierarchy where parents can choose the genetic makeup of their children, but only if they can afford it. Using Gattaca as a starting point we discuss the implications of new genetic technologies being only available to certain sectors of society.

Gattaca serves as a good starting point to think about inequality of access to genetic testing. If genetic testing is only available to those who can afford it, might this lead to an echelon of society who can, in effect, opt out of genetic risk? How can the rhetoric of choice serve to stigmatise those who have children with genetic conditions? Many of those working in genetics will focus on the patient in front on them. They wish to do right by them and offer them choices that they feel will improve their lives, especially when those choices are as emotionally loaded as pertaining to the wellbeing of their future children. However, how to we ensure that such choices do not end up perpetuating social injustice?