My Picks: Top Five News Stories Featuring Down Syndrome

Having only been working on this site for a few months, I decided to limit myself to picking the top five news stories featuring Down syndrome, rather than the top ten. Feel free to email me if I missed a story that you feel should be included here!

1. Trig Palin - Politics and results aside, I think that having a vice-presidential candidate with a child with Down syndrome raised the national consciousness regarding this condition and the families affected by it in a way that no other news story and person could have done. Pretty impressive for an eight-month old!

2. S. 1810- The Prenatally and Postnatally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act - The passage of this bill was the culmination of years of advocacy by both the National Down Syndrome Society (NDSS) and the National Down Syndrome Congress (NDSC) and ensures that parents receiving a new diagnosis of Down syndrome will receive accurate, up-to-date information and referrals.

3. More Parents Keeping Babies with Down Syndrome - Although there have been some questions about the accuracy of the numbers reported in this BBC News story, I am hopeful that this kind of coverage will make people aware of the ethical issues involved in receiving a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome.

4. NIH Research Plan - While the myriad features and symptoms of Down syndrome have been described and cataloged extensively, there has been far less attention (and research dollars) paid to how to best help families and people affected by Down syndrome. Hopefully, this coordinated effort by the NIH will provide answers to some of these questions.

5. Tropic Thunder controversy - I hate to end on a sour note, but I do think that the controversy over the use of the r-word in Tropic Thunder did, in some ways, raise the consciousness of people who had never thought about how hurtful this term could be. I am still not happy about Ben Stiller's response to this controversy, but in a perverse way it really did highlight the hurtfulness of slurs.

Did I miss something important? Do you agree with my picks? Let me know!