Patents Versus Your Health

ethzer0 writes "It's no surprise to the Slashdot crowd that patents are a hot topic these days. But a story on Wired reports that Edwin Stone and Val Sheffield, professors at the University of Iowa, have discovered links between 15 genes and certain eye diseases, which means genetic tests could be developed for the diseases. But often the scientists find the genes or parts of them have already been patented. Any diagnostic test involving a patented gene could infringe on someone's intellectual property."

Comments

Re:God

[Jorkapp]

I am God the creator almight and I claim all patents on ever gene in every living creature.

Perhaps, but we reverse engineered and open-sourced the human gene.

Patents are bad certainly for my health

[acidrain]

I think I suffer elevated blood pressure every time I read a patents article on /.