The Next Revolution In Medicine: Genome Scans For Everyone 126
the_newsbeagle writes "This year, a biotech company called Ion Torrent will introduce a new chip for its genome sequencing machine, which should enable researchers and doctors to scan a complete human genome for $1000 and in just a couple of hours. Compare that to the effort required to complete the first human genome: $3 billion and 13 years. Ion Torrent has nearly reached the $1000-genome milestone by virtue of a process called 'semiconductor sequencing,' and the company's founder says his chip-based sequencing machine benefits from all the efficiencies of the computer industry. At a price point of $1000, genome scans could become a routine part of medicine. And the price could keep dropping. To test out the technology, and to investigate just how useful genome scans are these days for your typical, reasonably healthy person, the IEEE Spectrum reporter got her own genome scanned and analyzed."
Just hold on a minute there, cowboy. (Score:5, Insightful)
Price isn't the only determinant of whether something is a 'routine part of medicine'. For the foreseeable future, there is remarkably little utility that an individual's genome brings to the table. It will become a very important part of medical research, but in terms of an individual's health, not so much.
It will be hyped. It will likely end up like 'full body CT scans" - a bragging tool for the seriously hypochondriac but of no help to the routine patient.
Even the Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) data which is pretty cheap now (basically what the police use for forensics) helps most people very little. In the context of answering a specific genetic question, perhaps - but not as a routine. When you send someone to a medical geneticist, most of the time and effort revolves around getting the person to understand what you are trying to accomplish and the pros and cons of doing so. Having whole genome sequencing just makes it even harder.
Re:Just hold on a minute there, cowboy. (Score:5, Insightful)
Price isn't the only determinant of whether something is a 'routine part of medicine'.
yes it is, do you know how much money your doctor can make by adding this to your routine blood work?
Re:will make a mockery of preexisting conditions (Score:5, Insightful)
It works great for countries where health is 'free' (through taxes), and their main goal is to make people healthy, not to extract maximum funds from your pocket. It's too bad that you don't live there.
Re:I worked at a DNA sequencing company for 5 year (Score:4, Insightful)
Data -> information -> knowledge -> wisdom
There are also non-gene mechanisms that need to be understood as well, since the genome is a blueprint, but what happens when the cell actually starts using that blueprint? Anyone who's had a house built knows that it's the contractors that actually make the house, not the architect, and there are an unknown number of contractors inside individual cells that control what gets built. What makes a particular cell use the "retina" part of the blueprint, and another cell use the "heart muscle" part? I don't believe we know all the answers outside the genome, yet. All those cellular contractors and we don't understand their language (yet).