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"Tests for hereditary predispositions to breast and ovarian cancer have figured among the first medical applications of the new knowledge gleaned from the Human Genome Project. These applications have set off heated debates on general issues such as intellectual property rights. The genetic diagnosis of breast cancer risks, and the management of women "at risk" has nevertheless developed following highly localized paths. There are major differences in the organization of testing, uses of genetic tests, and the follow up of patients. This article studies testing practices and ways of managing breast cancer risk in France and compares them with those in the United States and United Kingdom. It shows how the complex interaction between global and local factors shapes the multiple meanings assumed by the phrase cancer risk."

"Barbara Evans on legal barriers to discovery and clinical translation for genetic tests"

When the map of the human genome was presented to the world in 2001, psychiatrists had high hopes for it. Itemising all our genes would surely provide molecular evidence that the main cause of mental illness was genetic - something psychiatrists had long believed. Drug companies were wetting their lips at the prospect of massive profits from unique potions for every idiosyncrasy. But a decade later, unnoticed by the media, the human genome project has not delivered what the psychiatrists hoped...""

"The questions were: Was it anthrax? If so, was it a genetically engineered bioterrorism strain, or a strain that normally lives in the soil? How dangerous was it? And the answers, Dr. Musser realized, could come very quickly from newly available technology that would allow investigators to determine the entire genome sequence of the suspect micro-organism. " Yet the patient in question had died, his lungs weakened from the welding work he did.