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J. Craig Venter, of the longevity company Human Longevity, plans to keep the genomic data that he is gathering private.
J. Craig Venter, of the longevity company Human Longevity, plans to keep the genomic data that he is gathering private.
According to Med City News:
Much like the White House’s Precision Medicine Initiative, the genomics luminary has announced plans to sequence one million genomes by 2020. So, in keeping with the current vogue of open-sourcing data, does Venter have any interest in commingling his genomic database with the government’s?
“Unlikely,” Venter said, during a keynote speech at the Mayo Clinic’s Individualizing Medicine Conference in Rochester, Minnesota this week.
“I think this notion that you can have genome sequences from public databases is extremely naive,” Venter said. “We’re worried there will be future lawsuits from people who were guaranteed anonymity who will clearly not have it.”
This stance will likely inform Venter’s policy on Human Longevity’s new consumer-facing genomics business, which was just announced today. In collaboration with a South African health insurer, Human Longevity will soon offer whole exome sequencing that tells individuals about their most medically relevant genetic information – for just $250.
This public offering could dramatically increase Human Longevity’s access to larger swaths of diverse DNA – helping make that goal of one million sequenced genomes by 2020 a reality.