{"id":10180,"date":"2021-04-05T08:38:52","date_gmt":"2021-04-05T06:38:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/?p=10180"},"modified":"2021-04-05T09:03:01","modified_gmt":"2021-04-05T07:03:01","slug":"genetic-research-has-a-whiteness-bias-h3africa-is-trying-to-fix-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/2021\/04\/05\/genetic-research-has-a-whiteness-bias-h3africa-is-trying-to-fix-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Genetic research has a whiteness bias. H3Africa is trying to fix it"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1617604994810{margin-top: 36px !important;}&#8221;]<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"b-headline__title \">Genetic research has a whiteness bias. H3Africa is trying to fix it<\/h3>\n<hr \/>\n<pre class=\"m-b-20 t-xs-30 t-sm-41\"><span class=\"b-byline__authors\">By\u00a0<strong>Thor Benson<\/strong>\n<\/span><time class=\"b-byline__time date dtreviewed\" datetime=\"2021-04-04T08:00:48-07:00\">April 4, 2021 8:00AM PST<\/time><\/pre>\n<p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=&#8221;1\/2&#8243;][vc_video link=&#8221;https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=iHQQk2LUJVI&#8221;][\/vc_column][vc_column width=&#8221;1\/2&#8243;][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n<p>DNA is an incredibly revealing thing. Just by looking at someone\u2019s DNA, it\u2019s possible to determine what kind of health problems that person is predisposed to. This kind of information is even more powerful when gathered en-masse and used to provide health insights into entire populations of people.<\/p>\n<p>But there\u2019s a problem. Despite the fact that genetic information is more abundant and accessible than ever, the vast majority of the DNA that scientists use for large-scale studies comes from people of European descent. African DNA is deeply under-collected and<\/p>\n<p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]under-researched in comparison. Since Africa is the root of human evolutionary history, this information gap poses a significant obstacle to understanding how our bodies and diseases function.<\/p>\n<p>But thankfully, the genetic research community is aware of this problem, and a number of organizations have sprung up to address these disparities.<\/p>\n<h2>The roots of the imbalance<\/h2>\n<p>\u201cAbout 80% of participants in genome-wide association studies have European ancestry right now,\u201d Alicia Martin, a geneticist at the Broad Institute, tells Digital Trends. \u201cThat\u2019s a huge problem, and it emanates from a lot of different causes.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Africa has more genetic diversity than any other continent in the world \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Some of the biggest ones, she says, have cultural roots. Black Americans, for example, have\u00a0<a style=\"text-decoration: none;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/lancet\/article\/PIIS0140-6736(20)32032-8\/fulltext\">historically<\/a>\u00a0been subject to racist practices in medicine and are therefore often less likely to trust people in medicine. Bias is, of course, likely part of this problem as well, as researchers may simply draw from communities they\u2019re already familiar with. Another reason is that Europe is relatively homogenous, so it\u2019s easier to study\u00a0<a style=\"text-decoration: none;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.digitaltrends.com\/health-fitness\/best-dna-tests\/\">DNA<\/a>\u00a0from people with European ancestry.<\/p>\n<p>Martin says there are concrete examples of how this disparity causes problems in health research \u2014 like the fact that predicting health outcomes is four to five times more accurate for people with European ancestry than for people with African ancestry. Furthermore, she says this isn\u2019t just a problem for people with African ancestry, it\u2019s a problem for everyone.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/img.dtcn.com\/image\/digitaltrends\/54-gene-768x768.jpg\" alt=\"54Gene\" width=\"768\" height=\"513\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfrica has more genetic diversity than any other continent in the world, and there\u2019s a lot that we just do not understand about diverse African genomes,\u201d says Shawneequa Callier, a bioethicist at George Washington University. \u201cThere\u2019s still a lot we don\u2019t understand about the genomes of African Americans as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHumans originated in Africa,\u201d adds Martin. \u201cThat means African ancestry populations tend to be the most valuable for understanding the genetic basis of disease and understanding the causes of disease from a genetics perspective, because we\u2019re able to hone in on specific genetic variants more accurately just as a function of this human history,\u201d Martin says. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot that African ancestry populations can teach us that we\u2019re simply not learning because of these study biases.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Essentially, we can better get to the root of the health problems we all face with African DNA because Africa is where everything started.<\/p>\n<h2>Bridging the genomic gap<\/h2>\n<p>One organization working to fix this issue is\u00a0H3Africa: An initiative focused on studying the genetics of people in Africa. It essentially funds the building up of genetic research infrastructure in Africa and trains researchers in Africa to do the work.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith initiatives like H3Africa \u2014 where there\u2019s funding for investigators in Africa to engage in genomics research, to research issues related to scientific priorities in Africa, the funding rules require that the investigators in Africa are the first to publish data, or that they have a certain time period that will help them be the first to publish their data \u2013those are steps in the right direction,\u201d Callier says.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/img.dtcn.com\/image\/digitaltrends\/h3africa-768x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"768\" height=\"512\" \/><\/p>\n<p>H3Africa isn\u2019t alone, either. Recently, Nigerian startup\u00a0<a style=\"text-decoration: none;\" href=\"https:\/\/54gene.com\/\">54gene<\/a>\u00a0has begun working with hospitals in Africa to collect African DNA samples that can be used for genetic research. There\u2019s also the\u00a0<a style=\"text-decoration: none;\" href=\"https:\/\/allofus.nih.gov\/\">All of Us<\/a>\u00a0Research Program from the National Institutes of Health, which aims to collect 1 million or more DNA samples from Americans to help benefit medical research. Part of the program\u2019s core mission is to make sure that its database is representative of the American people, which means it won\u2019t be disproportionately DNA from people with European ancestry like we\u2019ve seen in the past. But even with this increased interest and attention in African DNA, Martin says there\u2019s still more work to do to address this problem.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith African ancestry populations, it would be great if they could participate more in these studies, but they need to be offered to participate in these studies, and there needs to be trust built to ensure that these genetic tests are not going to be misused in any way,\u201d Martin says. \u201cIt would be great if there was a building of research capacity within different communities to empower, let\u2019s say, African American investigators to be key leaders of genetics research into African Americans.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_btn title=&#8221;Read Full Article&#8221; style=&#8221;outline&#8221; color=&#8221;juicy-pink&#8221; align=&#8221;center&#8221; button_block=&#8221;true&#8221; link=&#8221;url:https%3A%2F%2Fwww.digitaltrends.com%2Ffeatures%2Fgenetic-research-african-dna%2F||target:%20_blank|rel:nofollow&#8221;][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1617604994810{margin-top: 36px !important;}&#8221;] Genetic research has a whiteness bias.<span class=\"excerpt-hellip\"> [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10182,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[175],"class_list":["post-10180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-175"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10180"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10186,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10180\/revisions\/10186"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/h3africa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}