Insurance industry probe
DDA to be extended
Insurance industry probe
An investigation has begun into claims that insurance companies have discriminated against people because of their genetic make-up.
As reported by ABC News, in the first investigation of its type in the world, the Federal Government-funded Genetic Discrimination Project (GDP) is investigating around 100 claims of unfair and negative treatment of people who have had predictive genetic tests, mainly involving life insurance companies.
The team is investigating claims that some people have been discriminated against after genetic testing for a gene linked to a specific disease, despite the fact that they did not yet have the condition.
Dr Sandra Taylor a GDP Team member says that around 47 per cent of 1,185 people surveyed say they have been disadvantaged as a result of tests for conditions ranging from Huntington’s disease and haemochromatosis to ovarian and breast cancer.
Of these 438 or so people, around 87 provided specific incidents of negative treatment, from insurance companies, doctors, employers and family members.
Dr Taylor says around 15 per cent of people surveyed say they have avoided applying for life insurance because they had been advised they would be unsuccessful given their test result.
DDA to be extended
The Federal Government is planning legislation that will extend the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) to include genetic predispositions in order to protect people with disability from discrimination on the grounds that they will be unable to perform the inherent requirements of a job in the future. This was announced as part of the government’s response to an Australian Law Reform Commission and Australian Health Ethics Committee report Essentially Yours: The Protection of Human Genetic Information in Australia.
The legislation – expected to be drafted in 2006 – will also ban employers from requiring genetic and other information on a person’s disability unless it is ‘reasonably required for a purpose that does not involve unlawful discrimination,’ said the response released in December 2005 by Attorney-General Philip Ruddock and Health Minister Tony Abbott.
The ‘inherent requirements’ defence will also be extended in the DDA. It will include all stages of employment, from hiring to dismissal, to ‘allow employers more flexibility to make alternative working arrangements if they employ a person who later becomes unable to perform the inherent requirements of the job. This is intended to minimise concerns about employing a person who may in the future become unable to perform the inherent requirements,’ the response said.
The government intends to establish a genetic testing advisory committee as part of the National Health and Medical Research Council. The new body – funded with $7.6 million over four years from 2005-6 – will help develop policy affecting genetic privacy rights, ethics and discrimination in employment, the insurance industry, medicine, immigration and the justice system.
