tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post8483489646517543672..comments2024-02-29T03:57:00.088-05:00Comments on The Mermaid's Tale: "All of us" Who are 'us'? Anne Buchananhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-51893054787922825052018-05-06T18:14:07.834-04:002018-05-06T18:14:07.834-04:00The issues are not new. The rationale of 'com...The issues are not new. The rationale of 'common' diseases was long ago, in the HapMap wedge project justifying Big Data, because if a disease is 'common' all groups have it, and the idea is that common variants are responsible, so they can be found in any ol' population like, for example, whites (who by chance have the money to buy drugs--I've been told this many times over the years, though always sotto voce).<br /><br />There aren't easy answers, but we do now know that most individual instances of common diseases are due to very different non- or only partially overlapping genotypes. The alleles have different frequencies in different populations and their effects may depend on their genomic (and environmental) contexts. The point is that this is not an easy Big Data solution. It requires deeper thought, about the science itself, and less thought about how to get mega-funding too mega to terminate when diminishing returns set in (as, in many ways, they clearly already have).<br /><br />Scientists should think about the problem, not about how to garner ever more resources. Science deserves support, but on a basis related to what is being investigated, not just as a welfare system for universities. I have elsewhere written about ways to begin to reform this system. But more, more, and even more is the way of life in science now, and reform is difficult.<br /><br />Relying on advertising slogans like 'precision' medicine and 'All Of Us' is being encouraged, as how you get funding, when it should be penalized. Science should be a kind of sacred area, not just another part of the hurly-burly struggle for More.Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.com