Free Testing Offered for Tay-Sachs Disease

The California Tay-Sachs Disease Prevention Program will offer free testing for the genetic disorder Wednesday and Thursday on the Cal State Northridge campus.

“This is a rare occasion when we can offer the testing for free,” said Susan Greenwald, a coordinator with the prevention program. “It usually costs around $75.”

Although Tay-Sachs is sometimes thought to occur only in Jewish families, where the carrier rate is 1 in 27 people, it also occurs in the general population in 1 out of every 150 people, said Greenwald.

“It can happen to anybody,” she said. “One in 150 is not a negligible number.”

Tay-Sachs is an inherited genetic disorder. The affected baby develops normally until about 6 months of age, then begins to suffer from nervous system disorders. Death usually follows within four or five years.

Tay-Sachs testing consists of a simple blood test that determines if an individual is a carrier of the disease. If both parents are carriers, a baby has a 1 in 4 chance of developing the disease, Greenwald said.

Tests can be conducted on anyone except pregnant women because changes in their body chemistry during pregnancy can lead to unreliable results, said Aida Metzenberg of the CSUN Genetics Counseling Program, which is co-sponsoring the testing.

The testing will be conducted between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the North Valley Room of the CSUN Student Union.

For more details, call (818) 881-1061.