Genomics Plc releases results showing the extent to which predictive DNA tests can reveal the likelihood of diseases from cancers to asthma and coronary heart disease.

The company that carried out Hancock’s test, Genomics Plc, has developed similar genetic risk tests for a range of other common conditions including coronary heart disease, breast cancer, asthma and diabetes.

The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, spoke about the potential of genomic data to improve disease management in the NHS.

Polygenic risk scores, which consist of combining information from thousands of individual genetic variants, can be a powerful approach to identify individuals with markedly higher (or lower) risk of particular diseases.