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Should you profit from your genome?

Nature Biotechnology volume 35, pages 18–20 (2017)Cite this article

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To the Editor:

As increasingly detailed information about personal health and wellness becomes available, the commercial sector is seeking to develop products based on personal health profiles that exploit growing markets for medical data. Genetic and genomic information is precisely the kind of valuable medical data that companies are eager to buy and sell. However, individuals express distrust of for-profit entities and have reservations regarding sharing their data as a result1,2. To encourage participation, some genetic and genomic testing companies are considering paying people to share their data. These companies hope that offering economic incentives will lead more individuals to make their genetic and genomic data available on this new market.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Christopher Scott for his input on this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Houston Law Center, Houston, Texas, USA

    Jessica L Roberts

  2. Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA

    Stacey Pereira & Amy L McGuire

Authors
  1. Jessica L Roberts
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  2. Stacey Pereira
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  3. Amy L McGuire
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Correspondence to Jessica L Roberts.

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Roberts, J., Pereira, S. & McGuire, A. Should you profit from your genome?. Nat Biotechnol 35, 18–20 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt.3757

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