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AIBU?

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Original poster

To think all babies should be DNA tested at birth

314 replies

ohagape · 04/12/2015 10:25

After reading that awful thread in step parenting where the poor guy wasn't even his 'sons' father and handed loads of money over to the horrible sounding mother, I really think all babies should be DNA tested as soon as they are born with the potential father/s, whether from a good relationship or not.

It would save a lot of heartbreak and wasted time and money. It can easily be told by blood types. My whole life my mum told me I had a different blood type. Then when I found out at my booking bloods and told her she got really confused about my dad's blood type. I really thought my dad wasn't my dad so he went and did a DNA test to reassure me. AIBU to think this should be a routine thing at all births and father's name shouldn't be on the birth certificate until it's done?

OP posts:
MovingOnUpMovingOnOut · 04/12/2015 17:16

Info here and apparently it's 15% of mothers but that's still quite a few of us about!

www.nct.org.uk/pregnancy/rhesus-negative-blood-and-pregnancy

Lweji · 04/12/2015 17:19

Crying face? 😭

sunny74 · 04/12/2015 17:19

Interesting that nobody has mentioned the right of the child to have an accurate family medical history.

I did say that uncertainty about paternity is something we all need to accept, not just men, in that none of us can be 100% certain of our family history.

There are definitely benefits to an individual in knowing their parentage accurately, but I think the downsides of compulsory testing would still outweigh the benefits of clearing up that uncertainty for the tiny number of people for whom a DNA test would actually give new and different information.

Bear in mind that unless/until compulsory DNA testing has been going on for several generations, you would still only know for certain about your own father - not your father's father or your mother's father or any of your grandparents' fathers. (Or indeed their mothers, since you can't be sure about informal adoptions in earlier generations.)

Even if your own father is the person he's supposed to be, if his father isn't really who he's supposed to be then the fact that your grandfather and two great uncles all had lung cancer is actually completely irrelevant to you. There's uncertainty in all of this.

I wouldn't be surprised if in a hundred years or sometime in the future DNA tests are done routinely, but if so I think we'll either be in a culture that is very controlling towards women's behaviour, and uses it like that, or conversely perhaps we'll be in one that has gone the other way so people are less firmly bound to each other (so infidelity around impregnation is just less significant).

StrawberryTeaLeaf · 04/12/2015 17:28

Interesting that nobody has mentioned the right of the child to have an accurate family medical history.

I think genetic relationships will rapidly become 'not assumed' anyway, if I can put it like that.

I have a donor-conceived friend who considers herself defrauded, but if one were try to assert on the infertility board (or same-sex parenting), for e.g. that 'a right of the child to x, y, z genetic information' even exists it would get messy very quickly. It's such a complex, emotive subject.

ratspeaker · 04/12/2015 18:11

It should be theoretically possible to distinguish between twins DNA, it would involve long and expensive testing. Whether it is acceptable in court has still to be proved.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25371014

Rhesus + or - really only refers to the D part, there are other subgroups in rhesus category.

This link gives an at a glance Blood Grouping.
www.transfusion.com.au/?q=node/77

As things stands the NHS hardly has enough space and laboratory staff to cope with the ordinary routine testing required let alone DNA testing newborns.
People already have access to private DNA testing should they feel they require it.

I have grave reservations about keeping DNA on file.

goodnessgraciousgoudaoriginal · 04/12/2015 18:48

vestal As I mentioned, I'm rh negative, which we only found out when I got my blood type tested at my first lot of blood tests when I got pregnant.

My husband is rh positive.

I'm not sure why you think this makes a pregnancy inherently more risky? It's certainly a pain in the arse - literally - with the anti D injections, but it's not like you'd have to have consultant led care or anything?

I should point out here that the entire french medical system were horrified/perplexed that I wasn't issued a card with my blood type on it as a child. Everyone has them here. Rather than weird paternity tests, I think everyone should have their blood type tested at birth and issued with similar cards. Everyone carries them around with them, and it helps in terms of if you are in an accident, if you donate blood, etc.

RaspberryOverload · 04/12/2015 18:51

There are many good reason why compulsory testing is not a good idea on this thread.

And in my own case, I'd feel deeply insulted at the implication that I could have slept with someone other than DP. I can count on one finger the number of men I've slept with.

Beth2511 · 04/12/2015 18:53

A friend of my OH raised a boy as his own for 8 years when he found out he wasnt actually his. He was absolutely devesated and it ruined both his and the boy's lives because hes not been allowed to see him since. Heart breaking but i do think you are being UR.

OneMoreCasualty · 04/12/2015 19:03

raising a child that's isn't biologically yours is a social issue and a personal issue, not a health issue. Nothing to do with NHS.

How would tests save a child's heartbreak? The child would be unlikely to be told if the partner decided to stick around anyway,

OneMoreCasualty · 04/12/2015 19:04

Beth, the issue there is social not just DNA based - I'm surprised he couldn't get some kind of visiting schedule via the courts based on a longstanding "parental" relationship.

Lweji · 04/12/2015 19:05

Nobody has the "right" to an accurate family health history. Or even generic history. We are lucky if we have it.
If nothing else because our relatives also have a right to privacy.

Lweji · 04/12/2015 19:11

I wouldn't be surprised if in a hundred years or sometime in the future DNA tests are done routinely, but if so I think we'll either be in a culture that is very controlling towards women's behaviour,

If genetic tests are done routinely in the future, then it will be for the whole genome and to identify individual risks of disease. Not for paternal testing, although that could be a side analysis.
The issue then is of insurance. Once you start calculating risks more accurately then some people could be uninsurable or everyone would have to start taking up health and life insurance virtually before birth.

Senpai · 04/12/2015 19:16

Here's the thing. Blood doesn't determine family.

If you want to be a father, you commit to it or you don't. You don't do the whole "Ok, I'll stick around for 3 years, let the child call me daddy, then bail".

Does this excuse women from deliberately deceiving someone? Of course not. But these men don't exactly come out covered in glory either.

If men don't want a child or have doubts, they need to get a test right away and hold off on being put on the birth certificate. None of this only being a parent if it's convenient for them. They had 9 months to mull this decision over, just like the woman did.

OneMoreCasualty · 04/12/2015 19:23

Well, quite. I'm reasonably certain a greater proportion of men piss off and don't contribute significantly (or at all) to their birth children then unwittingly spend monies raising a non related child. But there seems to be limited appetite for a uk database of deadbeats.

Senpai · 04/12/2015 19:30

Well, we wouldn't want to infringe on the rights of those poor men now would we?

Lweji · 04/12/2015 19:38

DNA testing has very little to do with absent fathers. In the vast majority of cases the mother knows who the father is, and it could be proven case by case. People can be located.
What is needed is political will to chase up those men not dna databases or compulsory tests for all.

HotterWok · 04/12/2015 19:44

Not sure what Prince Harry would have to say about this

Lweji · 04/12/2015 19:46

Do you suspect he's fathered anyone? 😈

OneMoreCasualty · 04/12/2015 19:50

Lweji, I wasn't saying DNA is helpful to find deadbeat dads. I just find it odd that there's outrage at the occasional story of a man spending his money raising a child that isn't biologically his but less at men who don't contribute to children they know are biologically theirs.

OneMoreCasualty · 04/12/2015 19:53

I would be very surprised if Charles doesn't know the DNA profile of both William and Harry.

Beth2511 · 04/12/2015 20:18

He is fighting in courts at the moment for it but its a long process

SoupDragon · 04/12/2015 20:55

Not sure what Prince Harry would have to say about this

What a pathetic comment.

mrsmugoo · 04/12/2015 21:12

Great idea! The NHS can use some of its scarce resource to DNA test my baby when I haven't slept with anyone other than my husband for 15 years.

dratsea · 04/12/2015 21:15

HotterWok That is the fear behind the Baronet of Stichill case currently before the High Court.

Lweji · 04/12/2015 21:23

But there seems to be limited appetite for a uk database of deadbeats.

What was this about, then?

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