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Ontario Ignores Gene Patent
Anonymous Coward writes "Well, for once my government the Ontario Tories have done something right. You see, there's this cancer test that involves a gene sequence patented in Utah. Thankfully, my goverment decided to
ignore the patent and help out those who need it. Ah the joys of living in such a liberated country." Different provinces have made different decisions about this particular patent.
So you're proud that your country is violating a patent that someone spent millions to develop? Are you similarly thrilled when your car is stolen? If people ignoring patents, they will not be developed.
I agree, this is just plain greedy.
I want to add that the impoverished African and South American nations that ignore patents, being primarily agrarian economies, also don't benefit from international patents of their own. Canada, as part of the first world, relies heavily on technology and patents to bring wealth into its borders. To ignore international patents is for them nothing more than the basest hypocrisy.
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
This is an important distinction.
If they patented the gene, it is already existing naturally, there is no reasonable infringement.
If they patented the procedure to detect the gene, they shoul get the benefit of their research (assuming it is a valid patent).
If they patented the gene as a method to predict cancer, then the arguement is quite murky. Finding cancer by looking for it is obvious. Finding cancer by looking for other unrelated factors is probaly a valid patent.
If this gene sequence is related to cancer (causative or a result of) then it is related to the having of cancer (like cough due to cold).
Maybe they just have a good patent lawyer.
Gene sequences can be patented in the US and many other countries because the naturally occurring sequences have "junk DNA" intervening between chunks of "coding DNA" that contain the actual genetic information. So a natural gene might look like this:
AxxxBxxxxCxxxxxxxxxD
where the x's represent the junk.
The patented gene sequence would look like this:
ACBD
So, you would not violate a company's patent by having the naturally occurring gene in your body.
The idea is to reward the effort it takes to identify what a gene does and isolate the sequence needed to reproduce the protein the gene codes for.
Now, when it was hard to do that, a patent might be warranted. Whether that is still the case now that it is quite easy to identify coding regions and sort-of "reverse engineer" what the gene does by sticking the code into a mouse, or removing the mouse's version, etc etc etc., and now that all the methods are very well known to someone "versed in the art," is a matter of much debate.
Awesome.. i whole heartdly support them..
here's the real kicker..
"The tests cost about $1,100 each but Myriad, which also holds gene patents for screening of colon and prostate cancers, wants all tests done at its own laboratory at triple the cost."
Cost of healthcare is high enough.. and don't tell me they aren't making a dime when a test costs $1,100 each to begin with, not only that but cancer testing will remain IN CANADA, not in a foreign (not like the US is far away) country.
Sickens me to see my tax dollars wasted, but this is one good sign. With several relatives either gone because of cancer, or currently have cancer, prescreening is important and makes curing and treating cancer that much more possible.
- Happy Canadian flippin the bird at stupid US patents.
i think that argument has failed before: "it's okay because it's for a good cause" ... i'd prefer someone just stand up and say "no, it's a stupid idea in the first place, just ignore all such things."
as stated by many, patenting a method for detecting a gene is one thing -- keeping other researchers from using home-grown methods to find that same gene is another. and claiming the gene for themselves is just right out.
patents were designed to give those who invested in research a return on those same investments, by giving them a temporary edge on the market. i believe it's important to reward such research, especially in the medical field. it's sad to see anyone, rich or poor, suffering from disease.
in the end, though, we must remember that both patents and copyrights were designed to override the default rule: we all own information of this sort. they are not permissions for us to have this knowledge after a time -- they are permission to keep it private for personal gain for a limited time. they are incentives, not inalienable rights.
do you support what could become (or is) extortion? inexcusably high fees for access to patented methods? life on the life, too bad, pay up? do you support, from the medical field, the practice of not revealing life-saving information for personal gain?
questions like this are -not- to be answered with the robin hood argument. whether 'tis for the rich or the poor, the same question must be answered -- what is the value of life?
Genetic patents are patently ridiculous because they almost always involve discovering prior art and patenting it or the process used to observe it. Generally, genetic patents are not novel or new in any way. They are akin to patenting basic algorithms being applied to basic operations - for instance, building a b-tree to store and retrieve strings in one patent and integers in another.
Congrats to Ontario for seeing genetic patents for the farce they are. I could care less about the profits of a few would-be monopolists over the lives of even one or two people. Save the people, have compassion on the sick, and most importantly, don't value money over the lives of the poor. You could be poor one day.
$G
-- $G
First off, I am against large pharmaceutical companies profitting off of the sick and dying. But before heralding this as a victory for freedoms, the flipside also deserves some consideration. Like it or not, research into cures for diseases require money, period. This research is very expensive, and thus so are the resulting products. I can understand trying to cut excessive profiteering on new found medicines(or tests in this case) but if any nation can afford to pay some cash for the research that was done, surely we Canadians are one of those nations... Unless of course the price asked was in American dollars :)
I imagine that there are a number of compainies in Ontario that are wondering if all of their development efforts have been wasted.
Usually, patent treaties and their like are reciprocal. I'll honor yours if you honor mine. I wonder what will happen to the Ontario economy when the US starts to ignore patents filed by residents of Ontario? Regardless of the technical validity, or lack thereof, of gene patenting, frankly it seems that Ontario has much more to lose.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
i know what you're trying to say but it's not right. the patenting of genes occurs solely to prevent others (other comapanies, research institutions) from exploiting/developing cures through the exploitation/manipulation of that gene.
the fact is, discovering a potential gene/therapeutic target is only the first step in a long (10-15 years) and arduous road to a publically available cure/therapy, which is when the financial floodgates finally open (wide). the gene itself is worth nothing (in terms of $$$ value of course) until a therapy which exploits that gene or its gene product is discovered, and THAT'S where the money is. that and only that is what should (usually) be protectable/patentable.
GENETIC PATENTS ARE FUNDAMENTALLY WRONG because they prevent others from developing or even researching potential therapies right at the beginning of the discovery pipeline, which clearly and absolutely PREVENTS innovation/discovery and is AGAINST the public good. the innovation is the *therapy* that exploits the gene, not the gene itself. i can "discover" a (likely) new gene with some cheap and nasty perl and the publically available celera sequences, but what does the gene do? is it "important"? how does it work? does it cause, or correlate with, the incidence of some disease? how? etc etc. surely i shouldn't have the right to claim (patent) that gene as my "invention" until i've shown that it does something interesting and can demonstrate a method of its exploitation, right?
all in all, GENE PATENTS ARE MERELY SPECULATIVE LAND-GRABS, like someone bursting into a department store on the first morning of the post-christmas sales and then staking a claim on all the bargain bins whilst crying 'i got there first!'. the bargain bin should be open to everyone until someone picks something of value out of it, right?
in the same way that all web-savvy people decried the ridiculousness of amazon and others with their ludicrous patents, anyone worth their salt in molecular biology/biochemistry knows that GENE PATENTS ARE JUST WRONG WRONG WRONG.
- a card-carrying scientist