Question: what inspired you to work in ethics and genetics??

Anna Middleton answered on 12 Mar 2014:

Hi @fluffyleopards Several years ago I met a 17 year old woman with breast cancer. As she was so young it was very likely that her breast cancer was inherited, i.e. due to a fault in one of her genes. She had a strong family history of breast cancer in that her mum, sister and aunts had also had it and several of them had died.

The family history told us that this was a strongly genetic condition, but this girl was adamant that she did not want this to be confirmed by a genetic test (blood test). She inspired me to explore the ethical implications of genetics – you could assume that everyone should know if they have a gene for breast cancer. But for this girl she was grappling with a life and death situation and knowing for certain that it was inherited was too much for her. I respected her right not to know. This led me into the field of ethics and an exploration of what is a ‘good’ use of the technology.