Yes, this is great news for the reported 5% who have Parkin mutations, what happens to the rest of us? How is it that scientists extrapolate a potential genetic Parkinson's "cure" or disease altering treatment to the idiopathic majority when they do not know whether we even have Parkin dysfunction? We are shut out of genetic testing.

Sorry, Soccertese, not picking on you, just am fed up with this trend of using genetics that apply to a select few but then used as basis of new treatment for all.

James Watson (of DNA famed team Crick & Watson) just published a scathing criticism of the Cancer research establishment and pointed to that very same "trend" to misapply genetic discoveries:


A number of Watson’s disgruntled colleagues have already begun to rally behind him in recognition of the disappointing results of the past several decades of cancer research. And the problem, they believe, has been the narrow focus on finding individual genetic signatures for each individual type of cancer and then attempting to base cures on these.



More of Watson' critique here: http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/...search-011013/

Plug in Parkinson's for Cancer; our researchers seem to be doing the same thing. Sorry to be an Oscar the Grouch on this, but I think it highly irresponsible of scientists to make these leaps when they have no clinical premise for it to actually work as a treatment for all causes of PD. I would not get so irked if they actually acknowledged that they have yet to learn if the majority PD'ers share a similar Parkin dysfunction. I would think that has to be established before we see human trials. Maybe I am missing something but to me it looks like a crap shoot.

Laura