I can't understand why anyone would take so much issue with this article. Saletan is just telling it like it is. There are different "races" of human beings. When we say "race" in reference to humans, we are not talking about different subspecies but different "ethnic groups". A human tends to have a genetic makeup that is similar to others within his or her race, because his or her ancestors have been breeding with each other for thousands upon thousands of years.

We know that genes can have an effect on how one's body metabolizes a drug. Therefore it makes sense to manufacture drugs taylored to one's genetic makeup. The problem is: WE HAVEN'T MAPPED EVERYONE'S GENOME. So in the meantime we might as well make the best of what we have. I'm not saying this is good science, but it is better than ignoring the fact that you can make some assumptions about how different ethnic groups will respond to a certain medication. One day it will seem crazy to think that pharmaceuticals were mass-produced for the global population rather than each individual, but until then...

From a scientific, biological, and genetic perspective, there is no such thing as different "races" of humans. There are groups, based on geography, who have substantially similar haplotypes which may manifest themselves in some sort of crude phenotypic way.

"Ethnic groups" are not the same thing as race, and few "ethnic groups" are so isolated in time and space as to constitute a truly isolated haplotype.

Right, I am not saying that we are talking about different types of human beings and you're right it doesn't really have to do with ethnicity as much as geography if you want to be as specific as possible.

Yes, there are groups of people who leave near each other and have "substantially similar halotypes" halotypes that are different from other groups of people. Yes the have different phenotypes too. These manifested phenotypes are what we call race. It's crude indeed, it's not biologically sound, and it's not specific. It's just a generalization. This day in age, however, race no longer means "skin color". It's more about ethnic background and culture. You don't call an albino Kenyan a caucasian. Despite his different phenotypical difference to others of his ethnic background, he still has similar genes.

The point is though, as a stop-gap before we can sequence every individuals' genes, we might as well do the best we can, even if that means lumping races together. Who cares? If I am chinese and a doctor says that he has a medicine that other people of my heritage respond well to, and there is genuine research that's been done that backs it up, I am going to take that medicine. I'm not going to say "hey buddy there is no such thing as race! give me whatever you're white patients take!"

The problem with your "substantially similar halotypes" claim is that the statistical variance "within" the halotype is broader than the difference between one "similar halotype" and an ostensibly disjoint halotype.

And the problem is that the phenotype manifestation of this is then invested with behavioural, capability and value mythology that is then used to suppress/oppress the "out" group.

As for the "genuine research" - that is at best few and far between. Again, the variance within the "halotype" is invariably almost a 1:1 mapping to the variance of the overall human genome, and thus it isn't useful.

It is true that within-ethnic differences are greater than between-ethnic differences. It is also true that between-ethnic differences are medically significant; that is, there are disease-associated alleles which differ greatly in proportion between ethnicities. So why ignore the information if it is potentially medically useful? Do you really think that a short period of a few ethnic-specific medicines will be used to "suppress/oppress" anyone?

Thank you Alive.

You are one of the few people not missing the point here.

Not again. The major premise here is false (its a conclusion), race is not "biologically" real, and the analysis thus nonsensical. This article means to say that treatments should be specifically different for different populations, some of differences in fact coincide with social and ethnic groups. This is not an interesting idea---treatments should vary within a political race too for reasons or biologically consistent with ethnicity or "family". But the point of the article is take this truism and use it by reverse syllogism to prop up Saletan's perennial race is biology campaign. It doesn't get there.

To say that race is biological is the same as saying that skin color, or lactose-intolerance, curly hair, or malaria resistance or some other specific phenotype, are biolgical---i.e., nothing, because its simply presumes the validity of the category vis a vis other categorizations. The fact that some diseases correlate with races says nothing about race classfiications because, obviously, 99.9 plus percent of our biology and disease experience is the same across humanity.

To say race is socially constructed is a truth that hs lost its bite in repetition. That is in part because Americans are oblivious to the fact that race classifications are different in different places in the globe and at different times in the same place. In countries with one race people expertly find immutible biological differences among themselves that never fail to correlate with social class. In this country the definition of black, asian, white, were legislated and repealed and relegislated and adjudicated over and over again in the 18th centuries. And one day it will change again. Unless, of course, Saletan is proposing some final and correct system of race classification.

Dave Chapelle had it right, we should have a racial draft (with pick-order based on record in the last round of wars, or something)

Thomas Jefferson, the famous genius, wrote that black people, a different species of human, smelled and had "black" skin because of their blood and the bile in it, and were congenitally stupid for undetermined but certainly biological reasons. Our desperate fetish for reverse-engineering biology from caste is ancient, has an unassailable pedigree. But I hope, this kind of dumb narrative disappears before it has a chance to depress and annoy my children when they are old enough to understand it.

Ok consider this scenario:

You go to the casino and they are playing a variation of roullette that also includes purple.

Now there are 9 tables arranged in groups of 3. You know that across all the tables the presence of purple varies so that there is no more than a 3 number difference between any 2 tables. But within a group that variance can still be as great as 27 numbers.

Each group also has a sign that tells you the average number of purple numbers in that group.

Now you are going to bet. But you have 2 choices:

1. Place your bet on a particular table without being told how many purple numbers are on that table
2. pay 10% of your stake to see a map of 99% of the numbers on the wheel

Which way do you bet?

Since we can test for the genetic markers of the halotypes, it is ridiculous to pretend that the phenotypes tell us enough about the underlying genetic variance to base medication on that. You TEST for taysachs or sickle-cell before you treat for it.

And given that this plays into the corrosive mythos of "race", to pretend that we should just generalize instead of testing is just nonsense.

If our intentions are pure, "feelings" about race should not affect scientific policy. No one is trying to put anyone down, no one is saying we need black medicine, white medicine, caucasian medicine, asian medicine. This is not Plessy V. Ferguson! Obviously race-based medicine would only be used when it makes sense. No one is saying "hey we should reengineer advil for Native Americans because many of them are alcoholics and we can assume they'll have enthanol in their system" nor is anyone saying "hey i hear some Jamaicans have this crazy gene that only 5% of other ethnicities have, we should make a drug for only them, cause they're different and it would an interesting science experiment"

Imagine this scenario:

You are in control of the world's supply of pants. In fact you have invented pants and you are the only one who can make them. No one in the world has pants yet, but it would really improve people's lifestyles. You plan to market them in every country. You have a factory with a machine that produces the same pair of pants over and over again. You make one size pant and it's generally designed to generally fit you and the people you know, the average size in your nation. you spread these pants around the world. but some are too big and some are too small, but in general they work for most. People may be too small or too big but they can make do. You build another machine that makes smaller pants and saves you money on fabric. You get a big order from Japan, and you know that most Japanese think your pants are too big. So what do you do? You send them a massive shipment of smaller pants, because Japanese people are shorter than your people. They will appreciate smaller pants. This is an acceptable stop-gap before you get the technology to make pants for specific individuals. It's not perfect.

The reality with medicine is that we don't have the resources to provide what is perfect for each person, but sometimes we can create a better solution than the standard remedy if we can assume something about people's genes.

Crisker, I realize that supposedly according to scientific "evidence" there is no such thing as race, but that is only in the smallest least intelligent way. I'm sorry, but it was less than two hundred years ago that our world was basically isolated, no interbreeding between people who had an ocean between them, we don't know how long this situation existed, but it is likely it existed for a very very long time. Just like two fish that were the same species but were eventually divided by a huge chunk of land, given enough time they will be different. I'm not saying what those differences are, or how wide they are, or even going to pretend that I know different medicine react differently in different patients, but the reality is race is real, you can call it what you want to, but its the difference created by being seperated for generations, are we different species or even sub-species? No, but we are different, since when has different been code for bad? Last time I checked a variety in the genetic code was healthy for the human population. I will admit I am white, but it seems to me, if they can create a medicine that works better for me, and say its because of my race, I am ok with that. We already know that certain racial groups are more likely to have some disorders for example sickle cell amenia, while whites, because they lack this are more likely to get malaria. Genetics matter, and pretending that we are geneticallly the same is really just arrogant nonsense. Some of this is not perhaps a direct result of natural selection, for example African Americans are taller on average than whites, because they were bred that way when they were slaves, still they are different that the white American population, it doesn't mean that they are any less human, it means that because of the past, they are slightly different than the white population.

Anyway to boil this thing down to just one phrase. Of course we're different, it doesn't mean we aren't the same.

Whenever I see anyone say or write

our intentions are pure

I immediately grab for my wallet and look for the exits. NO ONE'S intentions are ever completely pure. Nor does having "pure intentions" mean that you are not doing harm. Not even Mother Theresa as has been documented by others.

They types of diseases you are talking about are NOT as generalizable as "coverings for 1 pair of legs". And while the manufacture of meds cannot be individuated - at least with modern meds - the particular course of treatment, dosages and even the correct course of treatment can and should be.

By your "pants logic" we should treat all blacks for sickle cell anemia. But of course that would be stupid and harmful., So we first diagnose the existance of the disease. Same applies to BRC1 etc. And same should apply to what you are talking about.

This discussion seems (as most discussions on race are) weirdly ahistorical. When people discuss Black people, they're not discussing "Black culture", and certainly not "a set of physiological characteristics prominent among those identified/self-identified as Black." They're identifying people as Black and associating traits to that identification. That's all.

I'm not yet convinced, therefore, that race has gained some new meaning, much less a scientifically demonstrable quality. More likely, people are scrambling to preserve a notion that has always been, at its heart, fiction, only now, the fiction is, at last, being laid completely bare.

How, then, does one have a "race-based" medicine when race is a social and political construction? That would be like having a "Latino-based" medicine or a "Nevada-based" medicine, namely, silly at best, monstrous at worst.

No by the pants logic everyone already has the disease. Obviously I am not saying we are putting pants on people who are already wearing pants. That would be absurd.

One size fits all people from Africa, is a step up from one size fits all people in the world. Medicine should be manufactured to give the best possible results to those who are treated.

If a doctor says, "Research has shown that people of your heritage find this drug A more effective than drug B" Why in the hell would you want B. Maybe you don't have the necessary genes, but you might as well go where the chances are better.

Ok maybe one's intentions can't be completely pure, but I am talking relativity here. No one is trying to oppress anyone else. It's just medical progress. We can make better drugs now!

If a doctor says

"Research has shown that people of your heritage find this drug A more effective

Then this doctor is being dishonest and not serving the patient. Why? Because its at best "sloppy research" since phenotypes don't accurately represent the underlying genetic predisposition or heritage. The MD proper first has to test to determine that "heritage". If they make that test, and the "heritage" is confirmed - great.

BUT, just because sickle-cell anemia is a genetic adaptation for dealing with Malaria doesn't mean that you treat all africans for SCA

The combination of your "our intentions are pure" and "One siae fits all people from Africa" demonstrates beyond even a shadow of a doubt that we need to run from your waiting room in terror.

I am not saying you must treat people from Africa for Sickle Cell!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am saying that there is research that shows, certain medications work better for people of African heritage!!

You don't have to test people for African heritage. People generally know if they have African ancestors or not. If they say they are not of African origen, obviously the doctor is not going to dispute this and he is not going to give them the drug.

People metabolize drugs differently and people have different reactions to medication. The drug BiDil is only approved for use by African American patients, because studies show that it is effective for them.

Good Lord, if you don't want to use it that's fine, but the African American community has trouble with heart disease and many scientists think that they perhaps respond differently to treatment than caucasians.

This is not the perfect solution! by any means. Hopefully in the near future, we can look at everyones' genome and determine the best treatment. But right now the best we can do is say that if you have African heritage you probably will respond to this drug, becuase it works for others with a similar genetic makeup.

We are all humans, but for the 200,000 years we have been around, we have developed separately. That is why people who have lived in the same geographical region look generally the same.

It's not completely understood how our evolution has unfolded, but it is abudantly clear, for example, that people who migrated to Europe produced less melanin in order to absorb more vitamin d3 because they aren't exposed to as much sunlight! People in asia produced less melanin than africans as well but more than those in Europe. This is one example of specific genetics becoming prevalent in a population.

If you run from a doctors office in terror at the suggestion that you're gene type might lend yourself to a different course of treatment, you are probably not making the best decision about your health. If you are of African heritage your ancestors adapted differently to nature than caucasians.

when Europeans came to North America, they brought many diseases that killed the native population, because they were unfamiliar to that race of people.

If you live in America, you don't drink the water in Mexico because you body can't handle it, natives drink it all the time with no problem.

Why is it so crazy to think that people of African heritage may need different drugs than caucasians?????