Future Now
The IFTF Blog
Retail DNA
Navigenics is not the only company to market consumer genetic testing (see 23andMe and deCODEme), but it may be the first to do so in a retail setting (at least one as trendy as Manhattan's SoHo District). The New York Times has a short piece about Navigenics' temporary storefront in SoHo. If you happen to be boutique-hopping between now and next Friday, you can sign up in person for the company's services. Navigenics--in exchange for a saliva sample and a fee of $2,500--will analyze your DNA and will gauge the risk of your contracting one of 18 conditions (including breast cancer and Alzheimer's) for which there is a medically accepted strategy for prevention.
(Ironically, the company has been authorized to sell its service to residents of every state except New York; those who sign up at the SoHo store will be put on a waiting list, pending state health officials' approval of the company’s designated lab.)
Is personal DNA testing a worthwhile idea? Critics say that it may provide consumers with more detailed information than they can wisely use. As a 20-year-old student wonders in the Times, "'It would be nice to know, I guess. . . . [But i]s it going to turn us all into hypochondriacs?'" And expensive genetic analyses like Navigenics' may generate obvious, almost generic, advice about how to ward off certain diseases: eat a proper diet and exercise regularly. On the other hand, Raju Kucherlapati, a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School, believes that "knowing what might lie ahead could transform American health care by motivating patients and doctors to shift resources from treating illnesses to preventing them."
Perhaps the most important take-away for me is Dr. Kucherlapati's observation that, "'This is just the beginning of a wave of information that is going to be made available to patients.'"