Genetic Services, Economics, and Eugenics
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4516045 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Diane B Paul, Diane Β Paul (0000-0003-4053-0121, University of Massachusetts Amherst, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1998 |
| Volume | 11 |
| Issue | 3-4 |
| Pages | 481-491 |
| Publication date | 1998-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Science in Context (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0269-8897 • E-ISSN: 1474-0664 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0269889700003161 |
| PMID | 15168675 |
| OpenAlex | W2134347998 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 24 |
The ArgumentWhat are the aims of genetic services? Do any of these aims deserve to be labeled "eugenics"? Answers to these strenuously debated questions depend not just on the facts about genetic testing and screening but also on what is understood by "eugenics," a term with multiple and contested meanings. This paper explores the impact of efforts to label genetic services "eugenics" and argues that attempts to protect against the charge have seriously distorted discussion about their purpose(s). Following Ruth Chadwick, I argue that the existence of genetic services presupposes that genetic disease is undesirable and that means should be offered to reduce it. I further argue that the economic cost of such disease is one reason why governments and health care providers deem such services worthwhile. The important question is not whether such cost considerations constitute "eugenics," but whether they foster practices that are undesirable and, if so, what to do about them. The wielding of the term "eugenics" as a weapon in a war over the expansion of genetic services, conjoined with efforts to dissociate such services from the abortion controversy, has produced a rhetoric about the aims of these services that is increasingly divorced from reality. Candor about these aims is a sine qua non of any useful debate over the legitimacy of the methods used to advance them
Biology · Environmental ethics · Eugenics · Genetic testing · Law and economics · Legitimacy · Political science · Politics · Rhetoric · Sine qua non · Sociology · Biomedical Ethics and Regulation · Ethics in Clinical Research · Law · Philosophy · Reproductive Health and Technologies · Genetics
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,16 |
| Citation span | 2001 - 2015 (15) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |