More than 70 research organizations from across the world have joined together to develop a common framework to share genetic and clinical data, the New York Times reports. Among the organizations that have signed the letter of intent for this effort are the US National Institutes of Health, the Wellcome Trust, BGI-Shenzhen, and Genome Canada, GenomeWeb Daily News adds.
"The question is whether and how we make it possible to learn from these data as they grow, in a manner that respects the autonomy and privacy choices of each participant," David Altshuler from the Broad Institute tells the Times.
According to the white paper put together by the group, the aim of the effort is to develop a global alliance and technological tools for secure data storage that conform to standard principles.