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23andMe to Sell DNA Records to Drug Company

31 Oct 2023 8:37 AM | Anonymous

23andMe is selling everyone's DNA to the pharmaceutical industry. Yes, that includes your personal information if you are a 23andMe customer.

GSK Plc will pay 23andMe Holding Co. $20 million for access to the genetic-testing company's vast trove of consumer DNA data, extending a five-year collaboration that's allowed the drugmaker to mine genetic data as it researches new medications.

Details can be found at: https://boingboing.net/2023/10/30/23andme-to-sell-dna-records-to-drug-company.html. 


Comments

  • 31 Oct 2023 9:45 PM | Anonymous
    Shouldn't they be paying us for our DNA information? And what about opt-in? Not everyone chooses to take part in medical/scientific research nor should they be forced into doing so.
    Link  •  Reply
    • 1 Nov 2023 3:24 AM | Anonymous
      So soon after the 23andMe was hacked.
      Link  •  Reply
  • 1 Nov 2023 8:07 AM | Anonymous
    Doing a quick look I only find articles from 2018,2019 and one from 2021 online, none of which have the tone of this one. If my DNA helps catch a murderer I'm fine with that and if my DNA helps solve a health issue for someone (or myself in the future), well, I'm fine with that too!
    Just recently a pill I've been taking for years to make my life worth living wasn't available from the supplier - perhaps another drug company could come up with a better one and create competition - a bad idea - I think not.
    Link  •  Reply
  • 1 Nov 2023 8:13 AM | Anonymous
    This article on BoingBoing is a misleading embarrassment. Dick, you really shouldn't have linked this one.

    23andMe is upfront that their primary business is the facilitation of drug discovery via partnerships with pharmaceuticals. That their value add to the process is associating user provided health and lifestyle data with specific snp positions on the genome in gene identification. Helping identify genes involved in disease is one of the reasons many provide samples and survey data to 23andMe.

    The new $20M agreement simply extends the existing 5yr agreement they have had by 1 additional year. The data GSK is given access to is the same "de-identified, summary data from global genome- and phenome-wide analysis of the 23andMe database" that they have had for 5yrs.

    There's doesn't appear to be anything new, nor nefarious, in this extension. Every 23andMe customer has clear opt-in/opt-out options with some of the most well written non-legalese explanations of both science and legal in the industry.
    Link  •  Reply
  • 1 Nov 2023 8:53 AM | Anonymous
    So, perhaps now Congress should create a useful law and make ANY drug created, after using data purchased from a DNA testing company, free to the people who were tested. And since the government is so --intermittent and or selective about enforcing things like immigration laws (not the fault of the CBP who are the ones trying to do the enforcement but are subverted by political interests) we shouldn't have to have a photo ID to prove we were tested by X company. Ok, that's not likely, but only because our elected leaders will have to find some personal benefit to themselves from such a law beyond just being able to use it in some speech. The other question is why only 20 million?
    Link  •  Reply

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