This fact may soon change as President Clinton signed an executive order, February 2000, which prohibited discrimination based on genetic testing for Federal government workers. In Congress bills have been proposed to afford the same protections to workers in the private sector.6
Perhaps legislation will stop this runaway train of genetic testing in the workplace. On a global basis countries such as Austria, Denmark, France, the Netherlands and Norway are far ahead of the United States, having seen the potential for the misuse of workplace genetic testing, they have drafted and passed legislation to outlaw or limit genetic testing in the workplace. They emphasis the importance of protecting worker privacy rights and acknowledge the potential for discrimination in association with the use of genetic screening.7
The only way to stop abusive, demeaning and discriminatory genetic testing practices in the U.S., would be to pass necessary protective legislation. I believe Kupfer would agree legislation is needed to combat the abuses of workplace screening. The Wicks Group? I believe they need to wake up and pull their heads out of the "genetic screening" sand.
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