Whats the purpose of premarital blood testing?
Dear Cecil: I am getting married later in the year and to do so must get a blood test. What is the purpose of this? What kind of information could the government possibly be looking for? Is this test to ensure that Americans aren’t running around marrying their kin? — Engaged but Confused in Los Angeles Cecil replies: Got news for you, kid. Premarital blood tests haven’t been required in California since 1994. The test used to be required to ensure that you and your betrothed were free of venereal disease, chiefly syphilis. The tests were a holdover from a New Deal-era anti-VD campaign and were once required in virtually all states. But maybe a third have now repealed the requirement, on the grounds that the handful of cases detected doesn’t justify the exorbitant expense. Venereal disease was one of a handful of maladies (tuberculosis was another) that were deemed to have such horrible public-health consequences that they justified compulsory testing and other drastic measures. Accord
