Thursday, 6 June 2019

Quail's Nest


In December 2017 I shared a tale of two friends – septuagenarians Alan Robinson and Walter Macfarlane – who discovered they're actually half-brothers. At the time I thought their situation was pretty unlikely; first that brothers could be separated without any knowledge of one another, second that they should somehow find each other and become buddies, and third that they discover they're siblings. Then last week I happened upon a very similar story. Tricenarian (thirtysomething) Walt Gordy was diagnosed with lymphoma five years ago. He underwent treatment and nine months later was declared cancer free. He began to wonder if he was at risk for other health problems, so he turned to genetic testing service 23AndMe. That’s when Walt found out his best friend, Mark Tolson was also his half-brother. They’d both grown up as only children wishing for siblings. I suppose as recreational genomics becomes more popular we can expect to see more stories like this.

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