How many percent Czech are you? When identity is sold in a box
Did you know that popular commercial DNA tests, which determine how much you belong to a certain nation, are quite a decent political topic? And is it safe to have them done at all? Various questions and conspiracy theories about the misuse of your genetic information are being mixed in the public sphere.
It seems that this is a fashion trend. How much percent are you Czech, how much are you Hungarian and was that Polish branch of your family from the north or rather from the east? All these questions can be answered by these genetic tests.
Just as whether your family comes more from the Nordic nations, or you have roots somewhere in the south.
We are a nice mix of all Europe!
The fact is, however, that Czech genetics are very diverse. We are descendants of all who have ever met in our central European basin. We have Slavic, Celtic and Germanic roots. According to surveys, we are closest to the Austrians, Hungarians, and Slovaks. Many of us also have genetic ties to Germans, Romanians or Scandinavians. The purely Slavic origin is estimated at 35%.
I'm more German, what does that mean?
We cannot overlook the psychological impact. What if you find out that you belong to a large percentage of a nation that you do not like. The divided world of today may suggest to more sensitive individuals that it is not appropriate to have Hungarian, German, or Austrian roots. But we are rather entering into entertaining extremes. There are legitimate concerns for other reasons.
MyHeritage, Ancestry are the two most famous options. They also offer the chance to find genetically related relatives. This is useful when you're searching for ancestors who emigrated. Czech companies are EasyDNA and Genomica. However, a Czech police officer specializing in forensic science has also expressed that this can often be quackery, the results may not be accurate. And it's unknown where the material ends up.
Ethical and political overreach is already on the edge
What's already on the edge, however, is ethical overreach. It's far from just about today's overdone correctness. Rather, it's about who has the right to have your genetic information. Is it even appropriate to find out this information and then store and archive it? Isn't it politically exploitable in the future? You might dismiss it, but...
Are you Jewish, can you return to Israel?
Israel allows Jews to return to the country and obtain Israeli citizenship after proving their Jewish origin. The so-called Law of Return adopted in 1950 allows the return of, for example, descendants of Jews, or spouses of Jews, even if they themselves are not Jews. Therefore, could a genetic commercial test help? Officially no, they are not legally usable as reliable evidence. Even if such a test will be of interest to the applicant, he or she will have to prove his or her origin using family documents.
Influence of Influencers
On social networks, you sometimes come across someone who has had this test done and bragged about the results. However, it was more deeply dealt with by, for example, Jan Benedikt. The test was also done by a Refresher editor, he found more than a thousand relatives.
Do tendencies towards diseases calm or stress?
In the part of the "Ancestry Service" package, you will find out where your ancestors come from or how many Neanderthal genes you have. That's cool, but more interesting is the "Health Service" part, where you will learn predispositions to various inherited conditions and diseases, but also the probability of hair loss (for men), celiac disease, relation to caffeine, various tastes and smells and other genes that we carry in us. Or on the contrary, tendencies to very serious diseases. Awareness of celiac disease behind you can still be okay. However, the risks of serious diseases and determining the likelihood of what you are most likely to die from can already be something that can permanently increase the level of stress for more sensitive individuals. On the other hand, this will calm someone down because they have prevention in their hands.
The movie Breakthrough is a breakthrough
Perhaps you've noticed the Swedish crime mini-series Breakthrough (2025). An active policeman manages to solve a murder case that's about to be shelved, in collaboration with a genealogist. The film maps the work on compiling a DNA family tree, searching for relatives and thus reveals what we all actually take a chance on.
The miniseries is based on a real event from 2004, when the police could not catch a double murderer. After fifteen years, which was the longest criminal case investigated in the history of Sweden, a breakthrough was made by a policeman who accidentally read an article about a 40-year-old murder case in the United States. The method used was where the murderer's DNA is used to find ancestors on genealogical websites and a family tree is constructed up to the present day. Essentially, they find the murderer through the murderer's new relatives. This was achieved in the United States, as well as in Sweden.
The fate of materials from databases is unclear
Once you send your genetic material somewhere, it becomes part of a database. The companies then handle it their own way. Some are just stored, others are used for drug development, for example. The least protected are your rights in countries outside the EU.
And as the last case of murder investigation showed, that's problematic too. With your information, you share information about all your other descendants and ancestral lines without their consent.
Source: refresher.cz zdravotnickydenik.cz, jiribenedikt.com, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
