Congress sent US President George W. Bush a bill that forbids employers and insurance companies from rejecting job applications, promotions or healthcare coverage or setting premiums based on genetic test results.
Bush was expected soon to sign the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, passed by Congress on Thursday, which has been characterized by lawmakers and advocates as the first major civil rights act of the 21st century.
Federal law already bans discrimination based on race or sex.
“Your skin color, your gender, all of those are part of your DNA,” said Francis Collins, head of the National Human Genome Research Institute. “Shouldn’t the rest of your DNA also fall under that protective umbrella?”
Researchers supported the bill because Americans have been refusing to take genetic tests or have been using false names and paying cash because they did not want the information used against them by their employer or insurance company, Collins said.
The bill would prohibit health insurance companies from using genetic information to set premiums or determine enrollment eligibility. Similarly, employers could not use genetic information in hiring, firing or promotion decisions.
A 2001 study by the American Management Association showed that almost two-thirds of major US companies require medical examinations of new hires. Fourteen percent conduct tests for susceptibility to workplace hazards, 3 percent for breast and colon cancer and 1 percent for sickle cell anemia, while 20 percent collect information about family medical history.
In the 1970s, several insurers denied coverage to blacks who carried the gene for sickle cell anemia. The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California secretly tested workers for sickle cell trait and other genetic disorders from the 1960s through 1993; workers were told it was routine cholesterol screening.
Sickle cell anemia almost exclusively afflicts black people.
In another incident, Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Co paid 36 employees US$2.2 million in 2002 to settle a lawsuit in which the workers claimed the company sought to test them genetically without their knowledge after they had submitted work-related injury claims. The railroad denied that it violated the law or engaged in discrimination.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
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