My kid or someone else’s? Find out within three days.
It’s illegal in France, so suspicious French fathers get their paternity tests in Spain.
DNA has become big business in Spain, where private companies are cashing in on legal restrictions across the border and offering paternity tests to suspicious French fathers.
Some companies do 80 percent of their business with French customers. They offer “paternity kits” over the Internet to men who want to confirm they are the biological fathers of their child. The fees vary from 199 to 395 euros.
Sent in a plain envelope, the kit consists of tubes containing cotton buds, one for the “presumed father” and the other for the child. The “father” is asked to rub the cotton bud on the inside of his cheek to pick up cells from the mouth, and to do the same for the son or daughter. The DNA from the two samples are then compared.
The companies promises a response within three days. In the case of a positive result, the test is “more than 99.9999 percent” accurate.
The results can only be private and informative, because they have no legal value in France. Worse still, the law specifically forbids the procedure.
“The identification of a person by their genetic fingerprint … outside of a judicial procedure” is punishable by a year in prison and a 15,000-euro fine, according to French law. But many French fathers seem willing to take the risk.
