Since the late 1980s, the human genetics and genomics research community has been promising to usher in a “new paradigm for health care”—one that uses molecular profiling to identify human genetic variants implicated in multifactorial health risks. After the completion of the Human Genome Project in 2003, a wide range of stakeholders became committed to this “paradigm shift,” creating a confluence of investment, advocacy, and enthusiasm that bears all the marks of a “scientific/intellectual social movement” within biomedicine. Proponents of this (...) movement usually offer four ways in which their approach to medical diagnosis and health care improves upon current practices, arguing that it is more “personalized,” “predictive,” “preventive,” and “participatory” than the medical status quo. Initially, it was personalization that seemed to best sum up the movement's appeal. By 2012, however, powerful opinion leaders were abandoning “personalized medicine” in favor of a new label: “precision medicine.” The new label received a decisive seal of approval when, in January 2015, President Obama unveiled plans for a national “precision medicine initiative” to promote the development and use of genomic tools in health care. (shrink)

New developments in genetics could affect a variety of real property rights. Mortgage lenders, mortgage insurers, real estate sellers, senior living centers, retirement communities, or other parties in residential real estate transactions begin requiring predictive genetic information as part of the application process. One likely use would be by retirement communities to learn an individual's genetic risk for Alzheimer's disease. The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination based on disability, but it is not clear that it would apply to genetic (...) risk assessments. Only California law explicitly applies to this situation and there have been no reported cases. (shrink)