ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how Down's syndrome – rather than screening itself – is constituted in prenatal care. Professionals often describe the condition, in the backstage of interviews and interactions in which parents-to-be are absent, in largely positive terms. The chapter argues that professionals communicate, do not communicate, or mis-communicate information, together with power arrangements, social knowledge, and popular meanings about disability. It suggests that screening persists since the condition is subtly constructed, in consultations and the everyday practices and relations of the clinic, as a negative outcome, 108ensuring that particular ways of being in the world are threatened and stigmatised. In Freymarsh (FAD and FMD) and Springtown (SAD), professionals convey their misgivings of Down's syndrome screening on account of its (in)accuracy and its potential to 'open a can of worms'. The chapter provides three possible reasons for why Down's syndrome is absent within consultations: the familiarity of Down's syndrome; the organisation of care; professionals' knowledge of the condition.
