NATION Genetic testing ‘to save $310m’
A RADICAL plan to provide free genetic testing for all Australians aged 18 to 25 could prevent thousands of cancer cases a year, it has been claimed.
A groundbreaking new university study has, for the first time, found a population-wide genetic screening program in Australia would save the health system money and slash rates of inherited illnesses.
Cancer charity Pink Hope wants the government to take up the idea suggested in Monash University researcher Paul Lacaze’s research.
Dr Lacaze, the head of Public Health Genomics at Monash University, is trying to secure government funding for a pilot program for 10,000 young Australians.
His study found it would cost the government $600 million to test all Australians aged 18 to 25 for four different genetic cancers, cystic fibrosis, fragile X syndrome and spinal muscular dystrophy.
By identifying women at risk of breast and ovarian cancers, it would save $311 million in health costs and prevent 2411 cancer cases.
It would also reduce cases of fragile X syndrome and spinal muscular dystrophy and cystic fibrosis by 491 per year.
These calculations are based on the test costing $400 per person, but if the cost of the test could be brought down to $200 by setting up a dedicated national facility, it would actually save the health system money, Dr Lacaze said.
Previous proposals for genetic testing have suggested screening children at birth but Dr Lacaze said waiting until a person turned 18 was important because it meant they could consent to the test.
This was critical because genetic testing opened up the possibility of discrimination based on genes and it could have insurance and employment effects, he said.
Testing young adults would catch most people before they developed key genetic cancers and before they conceived a child and passed on any genetic health problems, Dr Lacaze said.
The health system already covers the cost of genetic testing for families who know they carry a cancer gene but half of the women at risk don’t have a first-degree relative with cancer and aren’t eligible.
Early genetic testing for cancer would have changed the life of Monique Correy who was 27 when she found a lump in her breast last year.
If she had known earlier she carried the BRCA gene she might have been able to avoid triple negative breast cancer that has put her career on the backburner and forced her through chemotherapy and a mastectomy.
Monique said she would welcome a program that proactively tested all Australians aged 18-25. After she was diagnosed Monique and her family went for genetic testing which found her father carried the BRCA gene.