In the section ‘Scientific myth’ I wrote about the personal gene card that the leaders of the Estonian Gene Bank Project (EGBP) had promised to give to the potential participants. The attitude of the population with regard to the participation in the EGBP, however, is not easy to determine exactly. There are until now only two investigations on the subject and the results of them vary considerably. First of them is made by Emor. Emor, the largest full service marketing research and consulting company in Estonia, has made an investigation in order to establish the level of awareness of the EGBP and to describe the opinions of the Estonian population with regard to the project. Emor asked 500 citizens of Estonia, and according to the result of this study, 65% of them were well-informed about the project. Another study was recently made by the Ethical Centre of Tartu University. They interviewed 914 persons in order to know their opinions about the EGBP. According to that study only 7 % of the responders turned to be well informed, and 62% said that they had heard something about the EGBP. From those people who had heard about the EGBP only 24 % affirmed that they want to become gene donors. From those 24 %, however, 96 % declared that their motive to participate is to obtain the personal gene card promised by the EGBP. The study carried out by the Ethical Centre revealed not very high level of awareness, and the motive of participation was in close connection with the unrealizable gene card promise. In the light of the second study even the adult people did not orient realistically between the possibilities and promises, and any talk about involving people under18 years seems improper. Teenagers may be enthusiastic, but is it possible to say that involving them in the project is trivial? Therefore it is to be expected that the scientists would follow international conventions. Tiina Tasmuth