ABSTRACT
This introduction provides an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book contains a brief socio-historical narrative of Down's syndrome screening and how the condition has intersected with scientific and medical worlds since the nineteenth century. Down's syndrome is one of the most common chromosomal conditions in the world, affecting approximately one to two of every 1,000 live births in England and Wales alone. The book explores how Down's syndrome screening is organised in the everyday practices of Freymarsh and Springtown and how it becomes 'downgraded' in various ways. It explain how professionals implicitly and explicitly define Down's syndrome screening, in both the frontstage and backstage of the clinic, as a routine affair. The book also explores the conduct of care and how the naturalisation/routinisation of Down's syndrome screening as a 'normal' part of pregnancy is accomplished in everyday affairs in two different ways.
