Call to offer genetic screening for married cousinsDoctors should offer genetic screening to immigrant communities that encourage marriage between cousins, experts said yesterday, as new research suggested cases of rare inherited brain disorders are eight times higher among Pakistani children born to married cousins than those born to unrelated parents. Married cousins, a tradition among certain Pakistani, Arab and Central Asian populations, have a higher risk of passing on genetic illnesses that are often serious or life-threatening. There is around one extra death per 100 births to such couples, scientists have found. Under the proposals, cousins who plan to marry would be offered counselling ahead of voluntary screening to assess their children's risk of inheriting a serious or life-threatening disorder. Professor Alan Bittles, a genetics professor at Edith Cowan Edith Dircksey Cowan (née Brown), OBE (August 2 1861–June 9 1932) was an Australian politician, social campaigner and the first woman elected as a representative in an Australian parliament. University, in western Australia Western Australia, state (1991 pop. 1,409,965), 975,920 sq mi (2,527,633 sq km), Australia, comprising the entire western part of the continent. It is bounded on the N, W, and S by the Indian Ocean. Perth is the capital. , and the world's leading authority on cousin marriages, said screening programmes should be backed by a campaign to raise awareness of the issue among communities considered at risk. The proposal comes months after Downing Street After Downing Street (ADS) is an organization that describes itself as "a coalition working to expose the lies that launched the war and to hold accountable its architects, including through censure and impeachment. rebuked MP Phil Woolas Philip James Woolas, known as Phil Woolas, (born 11 December 1959[1] in Burnley, Lancashire, England[2]) is a politician in the United Kingdom. for warning that British Pakistanis The term British Pakistani is used to denote a person of Pakistani ancestry or origin, who was born in or was an immigrant to the United Kingdom. Britain has a large Pakistani population since Pakistan was once apart of British India, once being the most populous portion of the were driving up rates of childhood defects by marrying their cousins. A medical survey called Born in Bradford Born in Bradford is a large birth cohort study based at Bradford Royal Infirmary, a hospital in the city of Bradford, West Yorkshire in the United Kingdom. It was set up with the help of European funding in 2005 and aims to recruit all (c. that began last year has so far signed up 1,100 couples, more than 70% of whom are married cousins. The study, which is due to report in three years, will investigate birth defects birth defects, abnormalities in physical or mental structure or function that are present at birth. They range from minor to seriously deforming or life-threatening. A major defect of some type occurs in approximately 3% of all births. among 10,000 babies born in the area. "I would support a good education programme that includes religious leaders, followed by premarital genetic tests so both individuals know if there is a risk," said Bittles. "What the government has to decide is how much is it willing to pay to prevent the birth of these children who are going to die at a very young age." Doctors in Bradford have identified more than 150 recessive recessive /re·ces·sive/ (re-ses´iv) 1. tending to recede; in genetics, incapable of expression unless the responsible allele is carried by both members of a pair of homologous chromosomes. 2. genetic disorders The following is a list of genetic disorders and their origins. Beside most disorders is a code that indicates the type of fertilization and the chromosome involved.
"It is only when parents have a recessive genetic disease that there is a risk to the child. If both parents have a gene for disease, then the chance of each child developing it is one in four," Bittles said. In 2005, the Labour MP for Keighley, Ann Cryer, was pilloried for voicing concerns about cousin marriages and suggesting it should be discouraged. "The problem is we have campaigns about the health effects of drinking, smoking and over-eating, but the primary care trusts are not willing to inform people about this," she said. "The trusts should be able to offer whatever genetic screening they can, either prior to marriage or before the couple have their first child. It's not fair that a couple only becomes aware that there is a problem once they've had their first child." 
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