Aggregated News
Imagine going in for a cancer screening, and the technician turns to you and says, "We're finished, but if I push this button over here, the machine can detect even smaller cancers. But here's the hitch: You have to pay $700 if you want me to push this button."
"You'd be enraged," says Ellen Matloff, director of cancer genetic counseling at Yale University Cancer Center. "You'd want to know why you have to pay extra to push that button. Why didn't they just do it right the first time?"
Doctors and genetic counselors interviewed by CNN say that Myriad Genetics in Utah is doing something very similar with tests that determine if a woman has a potentially dangerous genetic abnormality linked to breast cancers.
Most breast cancers do not seem to be genetic. Instead, they're the result of cells gone wild for no apparent reason. However, some women get breast cancer because a bad gene runs in their families. When testing shows that a woman carries such a gene, she has a much higher chance of getting breast cancer. These...
"You'd be enraged," says Ellen Matloff, director of cancer genetic counseling at Yale University Cancer Center. "You'd want to know why you have to pay extra to push that button. Why didn't they just do it right the first time?"
Doctors and genetic counselors interviewed by CNN say that Myriad Genetics in Utah is doing something very similar with tests that determine if a woman has a potentially dangerous genetic abnormality linked to breast cancers.
Most breast cancers do not seem to be genetic. Instead, they're the result of cells gone wild for no apparent reason. However, some women get breast cancer because a bad gene runs in their families. When testing shows that a woman carries such a gene, she has a much higher chance of getting breast cancer. These...