Australia May Ban Gender Prediction DNA Test

by Dr. Hsien-Hsien Lei
Posted May 12, 2007 in DNA Testing

DNA tests like the Early Baby Gender Mentor and Pink or Blue may soon be banned in Australia. The mail order kit is prompting fears that parents may use it to decide whether they should get elective abortion.

Australian Health Minister Tony Abbott:

I have to say, speaking as a citizen rather than as a health minister, I tend to view kids should be regarded as a gift to be cherished rather than as a commodity.

Abortion is tragic and I think abortion for sex selection is something that should be avoided.

It doesn’t strike me as something that people ought to be doing.

Putting aside the controversy of abortion, up till now, parents used prenatal ultrasounds to determine the sex with girl fetuses aborted far more often. As in India where elective abortion for sex selection continues unabated, “family balancing” without a history of sex-linked hereditary disease was outlawed in Australia two years ago. But parents who are determined to have a boy or girl will always find some way of hedging the bet.

In a NEWS.com.au article, one family with five boys who “desperately want a baby daughter” said:

If the Government had not banned the IVF technology, which costs lots of money, only people who wanted it would use it.

And how many people would that be? Sex selection in the petri dish, in the womb, or soon after birth happens every day. Will banning a DNA test put a stop to the practice?

Tags: pink or blue gender prediction, early baby gender mentor, gender prediction dna test, dna tests, dna testing, diseases, illness, health, genetics, genes, dna, genomics, genome

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5 Comments »

Pingback by Autism Vox » Genetic Tests & Abortion; Disability & Defect

2007-05-13 23:02:08

[...] too much to “choose” from now in regard to having children—-a test now exists to predict a child’s gender? And is it possible that, even more than “choosing children,” we are simply making [...]

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Pingback by The Genetics of Sexual Development — Eye on DNA

2007-05-25 12:13:06

[...] whether their unborn child will be a boy or girl. Some choose to find out early with the help of gender prediction DNA tests or ultrasound. But for one in 4,500 births, babies are born with a “disorder of sexual [...]

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Pingback by improbabilorama.com

2007-06-03 12:29:12

[...] diseases. There is fear that parents are also able to select the gender of their children by using at-home gender prediction DNA tests as early as six weeks [...]

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Pingback by Is the Pink or Blue early baby gender DNA test inaccurate?

2007-08-29 09:05:37

[...] from issues of accuracy, tests such as these are also raising concerns that parents may use them for gender selection aka family balancing. From Elisa Hatigan of Subversive Writer on “gender [...]

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Pingback by Gender DNA Tests Answer Common Pregnancy Question…Or Not

2008-02-27 13:49:55

[...] latest and most controversial way of determining a baby’s sex is by analyzing the mother’s blood for fetal DNA. Two [...]

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