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IEEE-USA Seeks Law Barring Genetic Discrimination

WASHINGTON (17 November 2003) — IEEE-USA is calling on Congress to restrict the use of genetic and related health information in hiring decisions. Though the availability of genetic information is growing, there are no laws to prevent employers from using this data to screen out prospective employees with genetic predispositions to certain diseases in order to hold down employers' insurance costs.

Congress has debated the issue of genetic discrimination for nearly a decade. In October, the U.S. Senate passed S. 1053, The Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act. However, unless the House acts on similar legislation this year, the issue could carry over into 2004 election-year politics.

IEEE-USA is encouraging prompt action to restrict employers from requiring health information except in certain cases, and to prevent employers from making hiring decisions based on health information. "We want to make sure technology created by engineers is used ethically and that it benefits society," said Mike McDonald, chairman of the Bioinformatics and Genomics group of the IEEE-USA's Medical Technology Policy Committee.

IEEE-USA holds that genetic information can be used to improve the quality of health care and facilitate personalized medicine. And genetic information is helpful to doctors since it can show a tendency towards certain diseases. But, according to IEEE-USA, the potential for abuse calls for legal limits. As McDonald stated: "This concern is not just with rare diseases. Everyone will have a predisposition to some disease."

IEEE-USA's position statement on "Nondiscrimination in Employment Based on Genetic and Other Health Information" can be viewed at: www.ieeeusa.org/forum/positions/geneticinformation.html.

IEEE-USA is an organizational unit of The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc., created in 1973 to advance the public good, while promoting the careers and public-policy interests of the more than 235,000 electrical, electronics, computer and software engineers who are U.S. members of the IEEE. The IEEE is the world's largest technical professional society. For more information, go to http://www.ieeeusa.org.

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Last Updated: 10 November 2003
Staff Contact:  Chris McManes, c.mcmanes@ieee.org