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In 1975, the Swedish government decided it could help medical research by collecting a blood sample from every child born in the country since 1975. Over time, this has left it with the most comprehensive DNA database in the world—containing genetic information on every Swedish citizen under 43. Until recently, it has been jealously guarded as a resource for the scientific community, and its data was mostly off limits for other purposes.
Now however, the government has commissioned a report on the possibility of opening up the database, which is maintained by Karolinska University Hospital, both to law enforcement and, rumour has it, to private insurance companies. Privacy campaigners in the country are up in arms.
The Pirate Party's Rick Falkvinge argued that such a move would be "an outrageous and audacious breach of contract with the parents who were promised the sample would be used only for the good of humanity in terms of medical research."
He added: "The instant there’s a mere suspicion that this will be used against the sampled newborn in the future—as is the case now—instead...