Bias and Inaccuracy in Marketing Noninvasive Prenatal Tests
By Editors,
The Hastings Center
| 03. 08. 2022
Photo by Scott via wikimedia
Bias and inaccuracy are pervasive in the marketing of noninvasive prenatal tests (NIPTs), concludes an early-view study in the Hastings Center Report. The tests are marketed to consumers around the world without regulatory oversight.
NIPTs are screening tests that assess the chance that a fetus is affected by various chromosomal and other conditions by analyzing fetal DNA in a maternal blood sample. In the absence of regulation, the responsibility to ensure that NIPTs are represented accurately and ethically falls to manufacturers.
The study examined whether manufacturers live up to this responsibility by evaluating English-language consumer brochures for NIPTs marketed globally. For a benchmark, the study used a guidance document produced by the Nuffield Council on Bioethics in the United Kingdom. Among the major findings:
- None of the brochures complied with all of the Council’s criteria.
- Fifty-two percent of the brochures misrepresented NIPTs as diagnostic rather than screening tests. Patients who do not understand that follow-up diagnostic testing is required to confirm a positive NIPT result may make decisions about their pregnancy, such as having...
Related Articles
By Annika Inampudi, Science | 07.10.2025
Before a baby in the United States reaches a few days old, doctors will run biochemical tests on a few drops of their blood to catch certain genetic diseases that need immediate care to prevent brain damage or other serious...
By Geoffrey A. Fowler, The Washington Post | 07.17.2025
Nearly 2 million people protected their privacy by deleting their DNA from 23andMe after it declared bankruptcy in March. Now it’s back with the same person in charge — and I still don’t trust it.
Nor do the attorneys general...
By Elizabeth Dwoskin and Yeganeh Torbati, The Washington Post | 07.16.2025
A group of well-heeled, 30-something women sat down to dinner last spring at a table set with pregnancy-friendly mocktails and orchids, ready to hear a talk about how to optimize their offspring.
Noor Siddiqui, the founder of an embryo-screening start-up...
By Suzanne O'Sullivan, New Scientist | 07.09.2025
Rare diseases are often hard to spot. They can evade detection until irreversible organ damage or disability has already set in. Last month, in the hope of preventing just this type of harm, the UK’s health secretary, Wes Streeting, announced...