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Genetics and Insurance Committee Sixth Report from January 2007 to December 2007

Welcome to the sixth annual report of the Genetics and Insurance Committee (GAIC).

Back at the start of the new millennium there was much more heat in the debate around genetics and insurance, and an expectation that genetic tests would become widely available from the NHS for many disorders within a few years. This expectation has not materialised, and the consequent, potential threat to the insurance industry of huge swathes of the population having better and more accurate information than the industry could estimate about when they might fall ill, or die, and thus buying larger amounts of insurance, and claims being made much earlier than they would otherwise have been expected to do, has been overplayed. Most of the fears around genetic testing and insurance have dissipated.

One issue that has occupied a significant amount of our time that we have not previously been involved with before was in contributing a response to a Government Consultation. The Government’s consultation on the proposals for a Single Equality Bill (SEB) has particular relevance to the issues GAIC is involved with, and I welcomed the opportunity for GAIC to contribute to the debate. The whole issue of whether the Government should legislate to prohibit genetic predisposition discrimination has been a major, thought provoking and very important topic. I know that many parties, not least our friends on the Human Genetics Commission, are, like us, keenly awaiting the Government’s next policy steps once all the responses have been considered. Our full response is at Annex D.

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