Almost every newborn baby in the United States gets screened for a variety of diseases. These screening programs vary from state to state. Better and cheaper screening technology allows screening for more and more conditions. Screening has been controversial, however, because many of the conditions that can now be detected either cannot be treated or do not cause symptoms until adulthood. Furthermore, testing for many rare conditions increases the number of false positive tests. Over the past decade, the issues raised by newborn screening have been addressed by the President's Council on Bioethics, the Hastings Center, and the American College of Medical Genetics. We provide links to reference material and papers about the ongoing debate about what should or should not be on the panel of tests for every newborn, the issues of cost, parental consent, and potential harms from false positive tests.

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WEBSITES