Where you can marry your cousin in US and shocking number impacted by inbreeding… as UK mulls cousin ban
Incest is poised to become prohibited by law in the UK, with a new bill in Parliament aiming to ban marriage between cousins due to various risks of birth defects.
But the US has no federal blanket ban on the books. Instead, the legality of first cousin marriage is decided by individual states — and 19 still allow it.
Figures suggest about 250,000 Americans are married to their first or second cousins, according to older statistics, and some experts say the number is rising.
Yet studies show that children born of two blood-related parents have double the risk of congenital problems such as heart and lung defects, cleft palettes, and extra fingers.
Children of this type of inbreeding are also twice as likely to be treated for an illness requiring antipsychotic medicines, like schizophrenia.
Marriage between first cousins is legal in Alabama, Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island.
In states where such marriages are not allowed, the punishment can vary. In Texas, Nevada, and Arizona, partners could face felony charges. In Georgia and Tennessee, it’s a misdemeanor.
This means that people found to have had a sexual relationship with their first cousin could face fines, imprisonment, or both.
Some states allow first-cousin marriages with some exceptions. In Arizona, Utah, and Wisconsin, denoted in red stripes, the practice is legal only when the partners are 55 or 65 and can prove they cannot have a baby
In addition to the 19 states where it is legal without significant restrictions, Arizona, Utah, and Wisconsin allow it in certain circumstances.
Given that each state treats marriage between cousins differently, it’s difficult to know how many people have been imprisoned or fined for this. But instances often go unreported, meaning that any estimate is an undercount.
Ten states allow it with specific conditions or exceptions: Utah, Wisconsin, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and Washington.
In Maine, for example, cousins can get married after they’ve had genetic counseling, which covers topics such as recent statistics on the rate of birth defects when compared to cousins and non-cousin marriage.
In Arizona, first-cousin marriages are not allowed, except if both parties are over the age of 65 or if one of them is unable to have children.
In Utah, while first-cousin marriages are illegal, they may be permitted if both individuals are over the age of 65 or if one party is unable to have children. Similarly, in Wisconsin, first-cousin marriage is prohibited. Still, it may be allowed if one cannot have children or in cases where both individuals are over 55 years old.
Kentucky was the first to ban marriage between cousins in 1850 and the most recent state to ban marriage between cousins was Texas in 2005.
In Tennessee, the legislature is currently considering a bill that would do so as well, with the state House overwhelmingly approving the measure.
Children born of incest are at least 25 percent more likely to be born with a severe genetic disorder passed down by their parents, which could include cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anemia.
They are also at a higher risk of developmental disability, vision or hearing problems, and heart defects.
Whether the practice of marrying cousins should be illegal in the US is fraught, with some arguing that a ban constitutes government overreach, while others argue the risk of birth defects, impact on family roles, questions of consent, and the public disgust make laws banning it would be a straightforward decision.
Two US scholars from the Massachusetts institute of Technology fell into the first camp, saying that laws that ban cousin marriage rely on government control to serve a public health goal, which aligns with the concept of eugenics, even by narrow definitions.
It appeared by Laita’s video that the family didn’t know their genetic issues occurred due inbreeding. They also couldn’t remember much about their parents or other family members
Marriages between parents and children, siblings, aunts and nephews, and uncles and nieces are banned in every state.
How many Americans have been affected by incestuous relationships is not entirely clear but a review of hundreds of studies by a sexual health company earlier this year estimated it to be 15 percent of US families.
That figure that was totally out of sync with previous estimates that as few as as 2 percent of Americans had experienced sexual contact with a family member.
The former study was not peer-reviewed, but Dr David Lawson, a psychologist based in Texas who specializes in sexual abuse, previously told DailyMail.com that whatever statistics exist on the subject are ‘probably conservative’ given that they’re rarely reported.
Instances of incest and inbreeding typically go unreported either due to shame that two consenting adults would face, or because one partner is being abused and can’t speak up.
Incest goes against the biological objective of mating – to advance the species by shuffling DNA.
Tight coils of DNA make up the 23 pairs of chromosomes. Within segments of that DNA are hundreds of thousands of genes that determine how a person looks.
A gene is either dominant or recessive. The offspring will generally gain the dominant gene of the two parents, such as brown eyes over blue eyes.
When both parents carry the recessive gene for blue eyes, their child will most likely have blue eyes.
And as both parents in an incestual relationship share DNA, the chances of them both sharing that recessive gene and passing it to their child is over 25 percent.
This is also important for genes unrelated to appearance, such as determining whether a child will be more susceptible to a disease.
Cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, and many other disorders are often determined by the expression of recessive genes in both parents.
A report in the Journal of Medical Genetics said: ‘A 4–5 percent increase in childhood mortality has been found in the offspring of first cousin marriages, and similar results have been reported in other species
Inbreeding often affects a child’s IQ and development.
A group of Iranian researchers tested 100 people with intellectual disabilities for a study published in 2019, which found that, in 61 of the patients, there were genetic changes that could cause the disability. Of these, 44 were caused by two copies of a recessive gene.
Children of first-cousin unions had a 4.25-fold higher chance of being born with an intellectual disability.
Parents who share DNA are also more likely to experience the death of their baby in the womb or in childhood or have a baby with vision and hearing problems, epilepsy, and heart defects.
The US became riveted with a small family living in Odd, West Virginia, who emerged from obscurity after the release of a 2004 documentary featuring exclusive DailyMail.com reporting that revealed the extent to which years of inbreeding had affected various generations.
One family member, Ray, could only communicate via barks and grunts; others were intellectually disabled and suffered other physical conditions. Many members of the family have suffered from a heart attack, while two did not make it through infancy.
Siblings Ray, Betty, Larry, and Lorene, and her son Timmy, live in a dilapidated homestead in West Virginia. A set of identical twin brothers sparked the family’s history of incest, with the children of Henry and John Whittaker getting married and having their first child in 1937.
