Miguel Sano, a teenage boy and shortstop from the Dominican Republic, is undergoing genetic screening and bone scans to prove his age —16 years old — to the Pittsburgh Pirates and Major League Baseball investigators, reports the New York Times. In a statement, baseball officials say they conduct DNA testing in the Dominican Republic "in very rare instances and only on a consensual basis to deal with the identity fraud problem that the league faces in that country." The Times points out that such testing by US-based employers will be outlawed in November when GINA takes effect though "it is unclear whether the law would apply when the tests were performed abroad on the citizen of another country." GINA's sponsor, Representative Louise Slaughter (D-NY), is not pleased. "I wrote this law specifically to prevent DNA from being used against employees by employers," Slaughter says.
There's DNA Testing in Baseball
Jul 23, 2009