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I know genomes and I didn’t delete my data from 23andMe

Too many people are panicking about 23andMe.

In March of this year, the California attorney general issued a warning that 23andMe was “in financial distress,” and he told Californians that they ought to seriously consider deleting all their data. What’s fascinating–and a lot of fun, for some–is that by comparing these scattered landmarks, called SNPs or “snips,” you can get a very accurate picture of how closely related two people are. However–and here’s the rub–some 25 years after the human genome was sequenced, and despite huge efforts to link genes and disease, there are almost no SNPs that tell you anything consequential about your health.

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