Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community - View Single Post - German Incest Couple Calls For Change In Law

tanguay'sstillgood · 03-03-2007, 06:58 PM

Wow, people. No way this should be legal (the children, I mean). If they want to do everything else, it is none of our business, as gross as it seems to most of us. Once they start having kids, they are increasing the risk of bringing disabled kids into the world, which should not be allowed. Here are some numbers for you:
-1 in 25 caucasions are cystic fibrosis carriers (i.e. have one copy of the recessive disease gene, so don't express it, but pass it on to 1/2 of their kids).
-a person carrying the disease allele has a 1 in 25 chance of meeting somebody else with it, in a random situation. There is then a 1 in 4 chance that their kids will get the disease. If I do my stats right (and I might not here), there is a 1/4 x 1/25=1/100 (1%) chance that a carrier will produce an affected child, given random mating.
-If a carrier mates with a sibling (assume the sibling does NOT have C.F., because if they did, it would be known), there is a 2/3 chance that the sibling carries the disease allele. The odds for this couple to have an affected baby are now 2/3, or 66%.
-for a random individual, there is a 1/25 chance of being a carrier. non-incestuous matings have an overall 1/100 x 1/25 = 1/2500 (0.04%) chance of having a C.F. baby. Brother/sister pairs have a 2/3 x 1/25 = 2/75 (2.7%) chance of having a baby with C.F.
This increases the chance of a C.F. baby by 67.5 times in brother sister couples! There is science behind these laws, they arent just myths. Finally, I will point out that the C.F. disorder is relatively common in caucasians. For disorders that are less frequent, incest increases the odds by far more than the 67.5X it does in C.F. Reason being, if, say, 1/100 are carriers (vs 1/25), there is less chance of two carriers meeting at random, so the odds are increased 267.7X in incestuous couples compared to random couples (in this example).
Sorry this is long winded, but I wanted it to make sense to the people without genetics backgrounds and also prove a point about why the laws are there. If anything here doesnt make sense, go ahead and ask.

Edit: I just picked up an old textbook and read that the proportion of abnormal children from brother/sister matings is between 1/4 and 1/2."

03-03-2007, 06:58 PM	#40
tanguay'sstillgood Scoring Winger Join Date: Nov 2006 Exp:	Wow, people. No way this should be legal (the children, I mean). If they want to do everything else, it is none of our business, as gross as it seems to most of us. Once they start having kids, they are increasing the risk of bringing disabled kids into the world, which should not be allowed. Here are some numbers for you: -1 in 25 caucasions are cystic fibrosis carriers (i.e. have one copy of the recessive disease gene, so don't express it, but pass it on to 1/2 of their kids). -a person carrying the disease allele has a 1 in 25 chance of meeting somebody else with it, in a random situation. There is then a 1 in 4 chance that their kids will get the disease. If I do my stats right (and I might not here), there is a 1/4 x 1/25=1/100 (1%) chance that a carrier will produce an affected child, given random mating. -If a carrier mates with a sibling (assume the sibling does NOT have C.F., because if they did, it would be known), there is a 2/3 chance that the sibling carries the disease allele. The odds for this couple to have an affected baby are now 2/3, or 66%. -for a random individual, there is a 1/25 chance of being a carrier. non-incestuous matings have an overall 1/100 x 1/25 = 1/2500 (0.04%) chance of having a C.F. baby. Brother/sister pairs have a 2/3 x 1/25 = 2/75 (2.7%) chance of having a baby with C.F. This increases the chance of a C.F. baby by 67.5 times in brother sister couples! There is science behind these laws, they arent just myths. Finally, I will point out that the C.F. disorder is relatively common in caucasians. For disorders that are less frequent, incest increases the odds by far more than the 67.5X it does in C.F. Reason being, if, say, 1/100 are carriers (vs 1/25), there is less chance of two carriers meeting at random, so the odds are increased 267.7X in incestuous couples compared to random couples (in this example). Sorry this is long winded, but I wanted it to make sense to the people without genetics backgrounds and also prove a point about why the laws are there. If anything here doesnt make sense, go ahead and ask. Edit: I just picked up an old textbook and read that the proportion of abnormal children from brother/sister matings is between 1/4 and 1/2." Last edited by tanguay'sstillgood; 03-03-2007 at 09:34 PM.