Introduction The Human Genome project (HGP) is interesting to me, because everyone has DNA and the way that scientists are able to tie our DNA to our possible future in the way of diseases is amazing and scary. The Human Genome Project is a project that was created by the U.S. Department of Energy in conjunction with the National Institute of Health in order to determine the complete DNA sequence of a person’s hereditary information. The project started in 1990 and was finally completed thirteen years later in 2003. The goal of this project was as follows: “identify all the approximately 20,000-25,000 genes in human DNA, determine the sequences of the 3 billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA, store this information in databases, improve tools for data analysis, transfer related technologies to the private sector, and Address the ethical, legal, and social issues (ELSI) that may arise from the project.” (Popular Issues Home, 2012) So far in the project: “more than 60 disease-linked genes have been identified and are believed to be advantageous to gene-based therapy development”; going forward scientist hope to identify all of the estimated 80,000 genes in human DNA. (Wattanapitayakul & Schommer, 1999) The total cost of this project was $3 billion dollars this includes the study of” human diseases, experimental organisms (such as bacteria, yeast, worms, flies, and mice); development of new technologies for biological and medical research; computational methods to analyze genomes; and ethical, legal, and social issues related to genetics. Human genome sequencing represents only a small fraction of the overall 13-year budget.” (ELSI, 2011) Sources of Construction Project Risk
The HGP project brought with it many risks and challenges that we still see today, which I will be discussing in the risks below. The risks that were involved when the project started will be discussed later in the paper. The first major risks that this project has to deal with are ethical, legal and social issues. The HGP team has devoted 3-5% of the genome budget to study genetic testing, fairness in the use of the genetic information, privacy and confidentiality, clinical application and professional and public education. In hopes to alleviate some of the fears of people have of what this testing will mean to them in the future. The timeline on this risk is that this risk does not come into play until the scientists have completed all their studies and are ready to release the information to the public.
Another source of risk is emotional strain due to the parents of these children or to themselves about what the results of these tests means to them should a gene be found that may mean they have Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s disease, Parkinson’s disease or breast and ovarian cancers. This would cause undo worry on let’s say a child that is found to have the gene for Alzheimer’s disease, this is a disease that strikes late in life these children will be worrying about this their whole life and may not live life the way it was meant to be because at some point in their life they may contract this disease. The other worry, along with this is how this information will be used against these individuals in regards to” insurers, employers, courts, schools, adoption agencies, and the military, among others.” (ELSI, 2011) The timeline on this risk is again not until after the project was completed in 2003; but what happened because of this risk was that Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) became law on May 21, 2008 which handles any discrimination from insurance companies and employers for any employee who had genetic testing done and was found to have had any predisposed gene. The law is not perfect and I am sure many more laws will be created as people find new ways to discriminate people because of this testing that were done. No employer can request this testing to be done without the employee’s knowledge nor can they fire or not hire a person based on these results. Although no case has gone to federal or state courts there were cases that have gone to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) board who ruled on the decision in favor of the employees.
A force Majeure risk that could happen is if the data for this genetic testing is accidentally left on a laptop that is taken, inadvertently posted to an unsecure site or given to the correct people but they misuse the data. If this were to happen the cost would be enormous because everyone’s information who was stolen is likely to sue and it would set the study back so far because people would no longer trust the people who collected the data and they would not want their information out there to possibly get stolen. This is similar to why some people still today do not use online banking they are afraid if they use it their information can be stolen, unfortunately what they don’t realize is whether they use it or not their information is on the web whether they like it or not.
Systems to Address Construction Project Risk
In this section I will be discussing the risks and how the project can avoid them, share them with another party or mitigating the risk as much as possible. The first risk is likely to happen and is a high risk for the project, because there can be major catastrophe if it does happen for the project. If this risk were to happen it would compromise the integrity of the data for other people to use. The risk mitigation plan would be monthly status reports which would include the description of the risks, the nature of the source meaning the people who are having the complaints as well as what those complaints are and how the data was either used against them or looking into ways to alleviate the social issues that have crept up. The other things that would be included in this report would be the impact of each of these issues and the probability of the failure of the project should these risks get out to the public. The responsibility of these risks would fall onto the project manager to detail these risks and solutions to any of these issues that arose, knowing the probability of these risks is high the PM would also need to look at other avenues to publish the data without compromising the people involved in the testing. The last thing that would be included in this monthly status report would be the decision points and criteria that would be needed in order to close out these risks if that is at all possible with this type of risk.
The second risk that was identified the emotional stress this would be handled with scheduled counseling session groups that would be setup on an as needed basis to help people deal with the fact that they have a chance of getting or inheriting these diseases and a way to help them live a longer and healthier life if possible. There really is no other option that I can see to handle this risk, and this risk would need to be monitored constantly and for a long period of time even after the data has been released. Since the results of this testing can affect people for years to come this may be something that will have to be included in a Reliability and Maintainability plan that will be based on appropriate standards so that individuals can get the help they need at any given time throughout their lifetime. This risk is likely to happen, but is a low priority, because we cannot tell how long it will take for a person to be ready to cope with the changes that may affect their lives.
The last risk is force majeure risk which is a risk that can happen at any given time and is an unavoidable accident. This risk is not likely to happen, but if it does it would be of high priority. This risk would require procedures to be put in place on how the data is handled and who it is given to. One way to possibly minimize the risk would be to have a confidentiality agreement for anyone who is given the data and at least push the responsibility on to them. This would be like the HIPPA agreement that currently exists for all healthcare information, this may apply to this risk but more research would have to be defined to make sure that the HIPPA agreement covers everything having to do with genetics as well. The other risk plan that would be needed is a plan that would say how this data is being saved as well as being stored and on what it is being stored on.
The people that would be involved for these risks would be the project manager, team and stakeholders. The other thing that would have to be considered is any third party people involved in these risks that may need to be included, but a risk analysis should be able to tell us who else would need to be involved. The planning for these risks would not be a static document it should be constantly changing as risks happen as well as any new risks to these areas occur; another thing that should happen is if it is determined that these risks are no longer a threat they should be removed from the risk action plans as needed.
The first risk event tree I will be doing will be on lack of DNA samples who want to submit their DNA or who qualify. I see this as a major risk to this type of project because it is so dependent on the DNA data that is provided there are many events that could prevent this from happening. One way to mitigate this risk is to ensure that the people giving their sample of DNA are kept confidential as well as assuring them that there data will be protected and explain to them how their data will be protected. In this case knowledge is power and the more these individuals have the more likely they are to donate to the cause once they know what they are doing can help save lives or even have patients more informed of their life decisions in the future. The second risk fault analysis will be on after the sample is collected and the risks that could happen after the sample is collected. Catastrophic Failure Fault Tree

Discussion of Catastrophic Failure Fault Tree Catastrophic failure for this project would be if the genome project would not be able to recoup any of their money because of bad ethical decisions that were made by its employees or stakeholders. Another event would be if the company was sued because of incorrectly storing data or violation of how the data was used. The last event that could occur would be social issues meaning that the data was spread by word of mouth to someone by the employees or stakeholders and the repercussion was that they are sued. The cost of them being sued would then cost the project more money and in turn could end the project if people could not believe in the data. One way to reduce the risks for these events would be to have a liability clause in the employee’s contracts that if they speak about the data outside the data then they can be held liable for any repercussions that may happen from them talking. Another way to reduce the risk is training on how to handle themselves when asked about the project or about any of the data being used in the project so that nothing is said inadvertently that could cause a lawsuit later on. In order to mitigate the risks the company could potentially have they could buy E&O insurance that could protect them from the employees possibly saying anything. You could also again mitigate this risk through training the employees’ on how to handle themselves when discussing this data. Figuring they are all scientist I don’t see much of a risk of them talking out of turn, but you should prepare for it none the less. I don’t think there is much of a way for them to avoid these types of risks due to the fact that you cannot control what people will say or when they will say it. You may be able to avoid ethical behavior again through training and possibly verbiage in their contract for when they were hired on to do the project.
Event Tree One