Pharmacogenetics can mean different things to different people. This evening we are talking about that aspect of the field that relates to the ability to use a DNA profile to help choose the best available medicine for a given individual. This will have tremendous advantages particularly for the use of expensive medicines where populations of patients have a varying response profile. It will prevent time consuming trial and error prescribing and will minimise side effect burdens for patients. It will also reduce prescribing costs and the costs of failed medicinal interventions. I see no ethical dilemmas whatsoever as this is not really genetics in the traditional sense. It involves using information about drug targets from the DNA signal. However I do see some pitfalls if people are overly politically correct about this, as this research has thrown up clear ethnic differences within these areas of the genome reflecting the ethnic differences which we also know occur in response profiles to medication.