[tinbad]

Having gone through two twin pregnancies (where the odds of these tests being correct are especially low) we declined all of them. Anecdotally, I know of several parents who had a positive test for genetic disorder, went ahead with the pregnancy anyway and children were perfectly healthy. Until these tests are close to 100% reliable I don’t see the point.

[CorrectHorseBat]

The point is that it is a screening test. A positive test will be followed by a more invasive test that has a lower false positive rate.

[sundvor]

"The good news is that the invasive test proved the screener was incorrect. The bad news is that it looks like you've now lost your baby. It was fine though!".

The risks associated with this extended testing are just not worth it, perhaps aside from Down's (from a numbers point of view). Even then, there are many completely gorgeous children and people with Down's .. chances are you'll have a curveball in life one way or another at any rate.

I have two children, one diagnosed with ADHD/ASD, the other likely not too different but too early to tell. Apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. Wouldn't change a thing, other than to avoid the ABA services companies like plague - they prey on your insecurities and you might face financial ruin for possibly no real benefit to the child if you go along with their spiels.

So, to see medical companies exploiting vulnerable new parents who will do anything for their children? I am shocked. (/S...)

[CorrectHorseBat]

You are free not to take the test, but I think we would have taken the 0.3% risk to see if it is really Down's. While children with Down's can be gorgeous, I am not up to the task.

[sundvor]

We did get the test for it for my two; can't recall if we did any extra ones. Believe we skipped them, at least on the 2nd.

I've come around to maybe change my mind since then, however I'd need to be in a very good position to be able to be up to the task.

I truly wouldn't have been, the ASD diagnosis was hard enough - and made magnitudes harder due to the manipulations of the "autism industry". Do this, do that, or else - you only have one chance for an early intervention, so better throw your own life away or you'll be a bad, bad parent.

[d0mine]

Tests (the consequences) are not harmless e.g., https://empowertotalhealth.com.au/new-study-on-screening-mam...

[XorNot]

"it worked out fine for me" is not particularly reassuring when the alternative is a lifetime of medical bills and possibly a permanent dependent.

[tagoregrtst]

The alternative is loving a human being and playing the cards you’re dealt

[honkycat]

No. I think this is a cruel and ignorant thing to say.

Wanting to have a child who is not special needs is not an evil thing. Choosing to not bring a a child with special needs to term is not evil.

Having a special needs child can dominate your finances, your life, and the lives of your family members and already existing children. People have a right to choose what what they want out of life, especially in the context of before a child is born.

[tagoregrtst]

“ Wanting to have a child who is not special needs is not an evil thing. ”

No its not.

“Choosing to not bring a a child with special needs to term is not evil.”

A huge evil. Just consider your next paragraph explaining why its not evil; it centers around how having a disabled child affects you and others. I do apologize, but I find your last paragraph frighteningly narcissistic .

[honkycat]

I can see from your comment history you are catholic. I don't see any point playing the "yes" "no" game with someone. I doubt you are going to convince me of your ethics, I doubt I will convince you of mine.

[rayiner]

Why stop there? It can be a challenge to have a kid who is ADHD, or is susceptible to depression or mental illness, or a different sexual orientation, etc. It’s not wrong to abort those children either, right?

[lelanthran]

> Why stop there? It can be a challenge to have a kid who is ADHD, or is susceptible to depression or mental illness, or a different sexual orientation, etc. It’s not wrong to abort those children either, right?

But we don't stop there. The bar is considerably lower than "the kid might have problems".

The mother, exclusively, can decide whether or not she wants to proceed with the pregnancy through to birth, and she doesn't need a reason other than "I don't feel like it". All those reasons you gave are still better than "I don't fell like it", and you somehow think that those are the wrong reasons?

[Broken_Hippo]

To be fair, the pregnant woman isn't a mother yet - unless she has other children. She's deciding whether or not she wants to (or can!) cope with pregnancy and the hardships involved. She's deciding whether or not to become a mother or bring another child into the world.

And yeah, it can look like "I don't feel like it" to a casual observer, but then again, it really isn't the casual observer's business. They won't know if it was planned or the result of failed birth control, if the father was/is abusive, and a myriad of other things.

And to be absolutely clear: People would try to tell me "I didn't feel like it" - nevermind that I've never wanted children. I'd have been sterilized years ago if it were readily available and cheap in the US.

[rayiner]

> The mother, exclusively, can decide whether or not she wants to proceed with the pregnancy through to birth, and she doesn't need a reason other than "I don't feel like it".

The morality of that is quite vigorously contested. And even in places that have elective abortion, it’s often only available in the first trimester, while many of these tests are performed after that.

But even if we accept the notion of elective abortions, it doesn’t follow that any reason is morally acceptable. What if the parents don’t want girls, like often is the case in India and China. It’s okay to abort them? What if we had an in vitro test for sexual orientation? Would it be okay to abort fetuses in that basis?

[watwut]

This is not true in every state. Abortion is in the process of being outlawed in United States. Texas outlawed it. Supreme court is hostile to it for religious reasons.

[xyzzy_plugh]

For one, we don't have a good enough understanding of those things to be able to test adults definitively, so it's a moot point.

That being said, if there was a test for ADHD and I knew what the odds were that my child would have ADHD, as someone with ADHD I would seriously consider whether or not I wanted to have kids or subject another human to that.

So, I don't think it's necessarily wrong, in some universe, but there's a line between adversities for which you can still overcome and thrive (the ones you listed) versus the sorts of things prenatal tests check for where, if they do have these conditions they are either dead on arrival, dead soon after, will wish they were dead for most of their lives, or at the very least will never be a contributing member of society.

I don't think the comparison you draw is fair.

[sundvor]

As someone with ASD/ADHD (professionally diagnosed), and with two children (one diagnosed the same so far), let me just say I'm somewhat taken aback by this.

I hear you say you have ADHD yourself - each case is different and such, but you're posting on HN and I'd say that puts you far above the rest of society. Sure there are challenges but it can also be a kick-arse superpower; learn to embrace it, and most of all be grateful for the things you have achieved.

If anything it has opened my mind about the beauty of a diverse society. There is more to life than a strict adherence to some notion of what it means to be successful.

I've done pretty well for myself even though I've also had some rather hard times - no diagnosis or help existed in the 70s/80s. Then again, people will face hardships in the most unexpected ways so if anything it's made me more resilient.

With the extremely low confidence factor in some of the conditions, this genetic testing is dangerous and unethical on so many levels.

[titanomachy]

I don’t think we understand these subtle mental disorders well enough for this kind of absolute decision-making. What is ADHD, really?

“Your child has an extra chromosome and will probably never live independently” feels deeply different than “your child has a gene variant that subtly affects their brain in ways that make it harder to focus in certain circumstances, and also probably in dozens of other ways that we don’t understand, and also many very successful people have this variant and it’s possible it even contributed to their success”. A society that routinely aborts children in the second case is starting to tilt into wild dystopia.

Not that we’ve identified such a gene, as far as I know.

[SkittyDog]

Wait, are you objecting to the abortion specifically? Or does it just bother you that people could have a conscious influence on the kind of children they do/don't get?

If this is just a coded abortion debate... Count me out

But if it's the latter... Parents have been "selecting" children of the "right" race, eye color, height, etc for millenia... It's called "being attracted to certain physical characteristics over others" and it's really quite pedestrian.

ADHD, depression, and schizophrenia all appear to have a strong genetic component. I think most people would definitely weigh the knowledge of their partner's family's mental health history when they decide who to have children with.

I mean, don't you think people should have the moral right to select their own mates, free from coercion? I think most people would consider that to be an absolute human right, and anything less would be morally condoning rape.

[tagoregrtst]

They haven't been consciously selecting for traits, have they? Not with the certainty of a 1% false positive test.

This is eugenism, with its adherents lacking the moral clarity of the of early 20th century eugenists - at leasts they honest about what they were doing!

[smt88]

As someone who has all of those in my family, none involve having a lifetime dependent.

Most people don't want to die and leave behind someone who can't care for themselves.

[bpodgursky]

The alternative is to take the same energy you'd spend on that one unlucky human being and spend it raising 3 healthy children who will go on to live full lives.

Parenting is an enormous time investment and families that take on the burden of raising disabled children almost universally reduce their family size. This is not a decision without cost, to those who lose their chance at life.

[Apes]

It's fine for you to live in whatever fantasy world that allows you to never have to make any hard life choices, but you shouldn't go out of your way to try to make others feel guilty for having the unfortunate fate of having to live in the real world.

[tagoregrtst]

You literally know nothing about me past my 24 karma point earning comments.

[zarzavat]

Many of these conditions would in the past have been fatal in infancy, and it is only through modern medicine that children can survive them at all. It's fair to expect medicine to provide the solution to the problem it has created. There's nothing natural about children having to live their lives in and out of a hospital.

[tagoregrtst]

So… let’s have HIV positive people die since they can’t naturally live without modern medicine?

Why do adults get to be rescued by modern medicine and not children ?

[oneoff786]

with one of those cards being a lifetime of medical debt

[tagoregrtst]

Thats a political and social problem, not an ethical consideration.

[oneoff786]

So what?

[bdowling]

Depending on what state/country you live in, care for a disabled citizen may be partly or wholly paid for by the state. The parents may also be able to become qualified caregivers, in which case they can be paid to take care of the child.

[jandrese]

It's still a full time job that precludes you from doing a great many normal family activities for the child's entire lifetime. There is also the danger that your state may elect budget hawks who decide to cut funding for the programs halfway through your child's life, leaving you on the hook for ruinous medical expenses. It can also be very unfair to your other children who are going to basically lose out on activities because their disabled sibling requires too much care.

[bdowling]

I agree completely about all of the challenges, hardships, lost opportunities, and unfairness. It is an awful situation to be in for everyone involved and no amount of money in the world could ever make up for that.