23andMe, a company founded in 2006 to bring genetic testing to the masses, this week lowered the price of its home DNA-testing kit from $299 to $99, co-founder Anne Wojcicki wrote in an official company blog post on December 11. Wojcicki said that the price drop was made in part to help achieve the company’s goals of getting the genetic information of 1 million customers, to better be able to help find common genetic diseases and health matters:
One million customers can be the tipping point that moves medicine into the molecular era. Hundreds of you have written to us about how genetic information changed your lives and, in some cases, saved your lives. We believe genetics should be an integral part of health care and we will work hard in the coming year to help genetics become part of everyone’s health and wellness.
