Chapter 13 - Noninvasive prenatal genetic diagnosis

Abstract

Noninvasive prenatal diagnosis or testing (NIPT) is a screening method that uses cell-free fetal DNA (cffDNA) from maternal blood. cffDNA can be used, from weeks 7 to 10 of pregnancy, to test for the presence of single gene disorders, much earlier compared to other screening or diagnostic methods. In this chapter, we will analyze the moral framework of noninvasive prenatal diagnosis, based on the following pillars: usefulness and moral acceptability in high- and low-risk populations for acquiring a genetic disorder, reproductive autonomy, counseling and decision sharing, tests done strictly for information purposes, the alteration of the telos of the future person, an analysis of its potentially discriminatory consequences, and finally we will briefly analyze on the concept of procreative beneficence and its association with NIPT. We will try to give practical recommendations for physicians who routinely used noninvasive prenatal diagnosis that should be taken into account whenever the particularities of the case at hand are outside the usual physician-patient framework.