The inability to trace DNA to actual diseases has serious consequences. As does the opposite problem - not being able to trace diseases back to DNA.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
With DNA, you have to be able to tell which genes are turned on or off. Current DNA sequencing cannot do that. The next generation of DNA sequencing needs to be able to do this. If somebody invents this, then we can start to very precisely identify cures for diseases.
A person's health isn't generally a reflection of genes, but how their environment is influencing them. Genes are the direct cause of less than 1pc of diseases: 99pc is how we respond to the world.
First of all, many human diseases are influenced by, if not caused by mutations in genes.
Scientists have established huge numbers of links between particular diseases and snippets of DNA, but in the great majority of cases, this has not yet been translated into treatments that can help cure patients. These treatments will come - tomorrow, or the day after.
In the past, geneticists have looked at so-called disease genes, but a lot of people have changes in their genes and don't get these diseases. There have to be other parts of physiology and genetics that compensate.
Once we all have our genomes, some of these extremely rare diseases are going to be totally predictable.
With the advent of DNA, we know that people have been convicted and sentenced to death who later proved not to be guilty of the crime.
If your DNA profile puts you at a higher risk of developing obesity, that doesn't mean it's your fate. You can take control of the environmental side of the equation and reduce your overall lifetime risk by a lot.
With DNA, the ability to find out a lot more with a lot less has increased our ability for identification.
We can now diagnose diseases that haven't even manifested in the patient, and may not until the fifth decade of life - if at all.