Should People be Screened For The Asthma Gene?

Erin:: In terms of helping to prevent asthma, should people be screened for this gene, and, if so, should their test results be reported to their health insurance companies?
Dr. Holgate:: Again, a good question to ask because, in addition to targeting the gene with new drugs, having a test predicting the development of asthma would be absolutely marvelous. Potentially, if you had one or two asthmatic children in your family and wanted to know whether your new offspring, your newborn, was likely to develop asthma, you might have a test to determine that. This is important because we know asthma is both a genetic and an environmental disease. By knowing what a child’s risks are for developing asthma by a genetic test, one could then do something about the environment- in other words, diet and other aspects of the environment the child might be exposed to-to prevent asthma from developing in the first place.
Erin:: So you could handle those parts of asthma you can control, as well as perhaps be treated with medications that may come out of this research.
Dr. Holgate:: Absolutely right.

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