In one of the first complaints filed related to the Genetic Insurance Nondiscrimination Act, a Connecticut woman has filed complaints with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities. According to the Boston Herald, Pamela Fink, 39, of Fairfield, Connecticut, alleges that her employer, MXenergy fired her after she disclosed to them that she had a mutation in the BRCA2 gene (which confers hereditary breast and ovarian cancer susceptibility).
The complaint was filed under the Genetic Insurance Nondiscrimination Act (GINA). The law prohibits employers and insurers from discriminating against employees on the basis of their genetic information. A summary of information related to GINA is available here at the NHGRI website.
More details about the complaints are available here via the Boston Herald. (Update: Dan Vorhaus at Genomics Law Report has more on this here).
In an age in which it is becoming increasingly clear that we are all mutants of some sort (i.e., based on recent high throughput sequencing of human genomes and exomes it is clear that most people will have several rare exonic mutations with the potential to cause disease), GINA is very important, and this may be a key test case depending on the facts that ultimately come out.
Update (April 29, 2010): We have another post on this now with more including video of Pamela Fink describing her complaint here.
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