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This dude deserves a special place in hell. Bullshit paternity test results.


crash_davis

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Who could've imagined this bastard would sell paternity tests which he knew provided inaccurate results?

harvey-tenenbaum.jpg

 

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/paternity-tests-dna-1.7164707

Canadian DNA lab knew its paternity tests identified the wrong dads, but it kept selling them

 

Harvey Tenenbaum, the owner of Viaguard Accu-Metrics, told a CBC producer with a hidden camera during a conversation in his office that prenatal paternity test results that his laboratory produced for about a decade were "never that accurate."

The hidden camera conversation unfolded in the midst of a months-long CBC News investigation into a years-long pattern of erroneous results produced by Viaguard's non-invasive prenatal paternity testing. The test — if done correctly — matches DNA from a fetus that is in a mother's blood with the biological father's DNA.

Viaguard, based in Toronto, sold its prenatal tests through various related online storefronts with names like Prenatal Paternities Inc. and Paternity Depot.

"The test was not that accurate…. And we're leery of that test now," said Tenenbaum.

 

Viaguard claimed to use a common prenatal paternity test commercially available to the public since about 2014.

Experts say it is highly accurate, if conducted properly.

A non-invasive prenatal paternity test, it matches thousands of genomic data points — known as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) — in the fetal DNA, which flows in the mother's blood, with thousands of SNPs in the father's DNA.

However, Tenenbaum seemed to rely more on guesswork than science when handling at least some prenatal paternity tests, former employees alleged in interviews with CBC News.

Sika Richot worked for nearly three months answering phones for Viaguard in 2019.

Richot said she was coached to ask women seeking prenatal paternity test kits about times in their menstrual cycles and the dates they had intercourse with different men — information that is useless for a DNA test.

Sika Richot worked for nearly three months answering phones for Viaguard in 2019. Richot said she was coached to ask women seeking prenatal paternity test kits about times in their menstrual cycles and the dates they had intercourse with different men. (Rachel Houlihan/CBC)

Staff put the dates into an online ovulation calendar to narrow down the possible biological father, she said. Richot then entered the information into a form that went to Tenenbaum for signoff.

"[Tenenbaum] would always make a comment like: 'It's definitely this one [the biological father]. It's this one, it's got to be this one,'" said Richot.

Samantha Friday, who also answered phones, worked there for slightly more than a year. She said Tenenbaum micromanaged all laboratory operations.

"It sounds horrible to say, but it was kind of like … get me my money. That was it. Just kind of get me my money," said Friday.

"I think anyone who has had their DNA done for whatever purposes in the Toronto lab should probably consider redoing them."

 

 

Mayer received a prenatal paternity testing kit from Viaguard in the mail. She was documenting her pregnancy for a school project and a friend filmed her as she pricked her finger with a lancet and squeezed drops of blood into a vial.

Then, she secured the inner-cheek buccal swab from the man she believed was the father, packed the sealed samples, put them in a box and sent them in the mail to Viaguard.

The test result said the man she tested wasn't the father. She sent a second set of samples to Viaguard from a different man. This time, the results said he was the match.

After the birth of her daughter, the presumed biological father demanded a postnatal paternity test. Mayer agreed and turned to Viaguard again. This time, the result said he wasn't the biological father.

"You know when you're just so hysterically upset, you laugh like you're just beyond emotion?" said Mayer. "There's no way that this is real."

A months-long CBC News investigation found a years-long pattern of erroneous results produced by Viaguard Accu-Metric’s non-invasive prenatal paternity testing. (Ousama Farag/CBC)

Two months after the birth, another laboratory determined the man Mayer first tested, the one Viaguard said was a zero per cent probability of a match, was her daughter's actual biological father.

 

Viaguard still does business. On its website, it offers postnatal paternity and maternal DNA tests, along with DNA bird sexing, bait to sterilize mice and rats, and dog DNA breed testing.

It runs websites selling treatments for foot fungus and dementia while operating virtual storefronts under names like Paternity Legal, Paternity Africa and Global Paternity.

Viaguard's continued existence frustrates some former customers like Mayer.

"The main thing I want for Viaguard is for it to close down," said Mayer. "I think that's a collective feeling. I don't think anyone would even imagine that it would still be open."

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