"Scientists and biotechnology companies are locked in a debate over the ethics of genetic patents"

[applegrove]

Scientists and biotechnology companies are locked in a debate over the ethics of genetic patents

By Stephanie Kirchgaessner at the Financial Times

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/6e93c6fa-9180-11e2-b839-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2Oib5auIl

"SNIP..............................................

For the past 19 years, Myriad’s patents have raised questions about whether any single entity should control the rights to DNA and whether an individual – or company – that discovers a particular gene should be granted the same privileges and protections that Thomas Edison once sought for his lightbulb.

A legal challenge against Myriad by the American Civil Liberties Union, an activist group known for its defence of free speech, is forcing the high court to confront this question: can genes be patented?

The case could have sweeping implications for the $83bn biotechnology industry, which has argued that a whole range of patents that encourage private investment in start-ups could be at stake.

Legal scholars are closely watching the patent case, too. There is a suspicion – feared by some, celebrated by others – that the court is drawing important new distinctions about what constitutes an invention (which is patent-eligible) and what is simply a discovery of a naturally occurring phenomenon (which may not be patent-eligible, even if it represents cutting-edge science). In the age of genetics, when a gene found in a human is identical to one found in a fly, knowing the difference is more complex than it seems

.............................................SNIP"