Adjunct Fellow  Jon Entine

Seven years ago, I recieved a horrific call from my sister, who was then 54. She had noticed a lump in her breast. It was diagnosed as a rare form of cancer known as BRCA2, or BReast CAncer 2 mutation 6l74delT, one of three breast and ovarian mutations that prominently target Jews or descendants of Jews.

My sister has survived her travail, but the long-term prognosis is mixed. It's estimated that one in 43 Jews (about 2.3 percent), women and men, carries one of these three gene faults. My mother, grandmother, and aunt all died nearly 30 years ago of mysterious cancers. Our family tree disappears into the 19th century eastern European Diaspora, so it's difficult to trace the history of these wayward genes. Were we the victims of bad luck? Or bad DNA?

We've all heard the phrase, "We are, regardless of race, 99 percent the same. The inclination even by some scientists to highlight the threads that bind together the world's diverse populations and to underplay our uniqueness is certainly understandable. But it's also misleading. . . .

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Jon Entine is an adjunct fellow at AEI.