Nice post!

My first question was: Should they be compensated at all? Then I realized how I’d feel in the same case. This is MY genetic code…

Anyway, giving them medical help would be enough. What do you think?

Of course they should be compensated. If the samples are worth $85, they’re worth $85 to the people who provide the samples. Why are the institutions making money off the samples if they were obtained for free? the Why don’t they ask a bunch of suburban white families to contribute their genes for free? Vultures. They’re just taking advantage of unsophisticated people.

That nonsense about benefiting mankind is a crock. Like the US govt gives a crap about mankind. This is about pharmaceuticals. It’s amazing that after everything that has gone down people are still so unabashed about about point blank theft and exploitation of American Indians. Thank goodness they can see through it.

Great post Hsien. I think it all depends on what they consented to originally. Did they consent to have their blood drawn and cell lines made/stored/distributed? Did they consent to a specific study or all future research? Historically, projects that don’t work these issues out from the get-go have problems
like this, and for good reason. So, the question I’m curious about is: Who changed their mind about the use of the samples? The researchers? Or the individuals?

If there was no written contract restricting the future “auctioning” of their DNA, then , legally, they cannot request compensation. However, they might was to pursue some other recourse to address a perceived injustice.

This kind of thing was bound to happen. One cannot fault the people who are profiting from this unless they have violated some contract and/or established law. It might be construed as unethical, but then the list for this kind thing would be immeasurably long.

As a whole, I do not think anyone should be compensated for their participation in genetic studies. No one forced them to provide samples. If they had been forced, that would be a completely different issue.

I think this article clearly shows a bias in favor of the Amerindians by phrasing the question the way you did. If you are going to try to be impartial and present a topic in an objective manner, you should abstain from using leading questions. So much PC on the Internet. Wish I could be compensated in someway for having to confront it on a daily basis both in and out of cyberspace. Only a wish.

[...] up on yesterday’s discussion of the sale (or biopiracy) of Amerindian DNA for research purposes, National Geographic’s Genographic Project has published the first [...]

I covered the biopiracy issue a few years back for The Alchemist on ChemWeb with regard to the Neem tree, but this takes it to the next level where companies are not simply plundering natural sources they are plundering the people themselves

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As always, anthropologist John Hawks has some insightful comments to say on this subject.

The blood that would not rest

We all have a tendency to simplify the big questions, and from pedestrian reasoning, try and squish things into diminutive compartments. Sound bite; two minutes 25 words or less- explain whether it’s wrong or right. Good or Evil. (Capitol punishment, euthanasia, bio-piracy, etc.)
It’s true, America (the New World. It used to be Europe that did the exploiting. Before that, North Africa) has exploited the North American Indian (and a long list of everybody else). But I think we make a big mistake when we say the US government this, and the Pharmaceutical companies that. You or I may not work in the US government or at a Pharmaceutical company, but maybe our Aunt does, or our children’s mate’s brother’s friend’s father. And anyway, it doesn’t matter if we work there or not. In some respect, we are Them. We buy and use the products. Pointe finale. We are all connected. Change can come only on an individual level. What’s missing from the equation? It’s not education, per se. Education sounds a little missionary to me. But what is missing is dialogue, discussion; Exchange of Ideas. Ask yourself this; what makes you the most upset? Is it that someone asked you for a favour and didn’t pay you back, or that someone asked you for something and later on you found out that it was being used differently but no one bothered to tell you? There is nothing worse than feeling used. If there is no hidden agenda, then the feelings of being used come from lack of communication. And Communication, my friends, is the biggest challenge in life. We get to practice with our parents and then our peers, later on with our children. We practice everyday with strangers and small time acquaintances.
It’s funny; I was going to enrol my father in the Genographic Project as a gift. I certainly wasn’t aware of any indigenous conflict. But you see, that’s the problem; why aren’t these issues addressed on their site? I’m not joking. I am serious. We do this sort of thing on a smaller scale in our own lives; we get into a pickle, and if no one is looking, we sweep it under the carpet before there is any dust.
Question: Do people think that Big Business and Big Government and Big Brother are the only groups who grapple with the concept of openness and honesty? Everybody grapples with this; everyone has a space to question themselves. Which leads to another big question: what can we live with and what can we not?

Hmmm, I’m torn. On the one hand, science benefits us and I read that the sale of blood was to other scientists under strict guidelines and not for commerical purposes. That’s how our world works, unfortunately, our trades are conducted with money - even the most sacred. Medical doctors and mental health care professionals,for example, get paid money either by the government, or through private transactions. We walk a tricky line between need (money for our services to live) and greed (distortion of our services to community in the pursuit of money). Until we clean up our act spiritually, Traditionals who are trying to save their own people from our cultural distortions are not going to trust us or want to deal with us. And we can clean up our act if we make it a priority.

I also think that the scientists who originally collected that blood had an obligation to explain to their research subjects what would be done with the genetic material. That was unethical and usually there is an ethics board to hold people accountable for such a failure. Legal doesn’t make it right.

Unfortunately, the way it was handled by the scientists in question does smack of hangover colonialist attitudes - and science, like any of our other cultural institutions has been steeped in such attitudes and arrogant practices. Just look at how we put human remains and other animal species on display for our “education”. Yet we’d be horrified if someone stuck our dead relative in a museum (robbed from the grave) or stuffed our beloved “pet” dog or cat and put the carcass somewhere official for all to gawk at. Sometimes our most “respected” institutions don’t act all that respectable, when you consider the larger philosophical and ethical questions of privilege and entitlement.

I see though that I have to pay $100 to participate in the project (rather than be a paid subject) and I probably will do some form of testing, and likely the Genographic Project, because I have questions about my own genealogy, that I’d liked answered, so I personally need such information as the Project is seeking to create.

Cultural stories should be able to survive science and - again, depending on the intention of the scientists with the results - could enrich the understanding of those stories.

[...] at Eye on DNA, one of my most popular posts in recent weeks - Amerindian DNA Sells for 55 Dollars [...]

[...] 30, 2007 in DNA Around the World The Karitiana Indians of the Amazon aren’t the only ones offended by the sale of their DNA. The Cook Islands has declared that it will no longer be “the guinea pig of the South [...]