Supreme Court: No Patents For Natural DNA Sequences

ColdWetDog writes "The ongoing story of Myriad Genetics versus the rest of the world has come to an end. In a 9-0 decision, the US Supreme Court has decided that human genes cannot be patented. From a brief Bloomberg article: 'Writing for the court, Justice Clarence Thomas said isolated DNA is a "product of nature and not patent eligible merely because it has been isolated." At the same time, Thomas said synthetic molecules known as complementary DNA, or cDNA, can be patented because they require a significant amount of human manipulation to create.' Seems perfectly sane. Raw genes, the ones you find in nature are, wait for it — natural. Other bits of manipulated DNA / RNA / protein which take skill and time to create are potentially patentable. Oddly, Myriad Genetics stock actually rose on that information." Adds reader the eric conspiracy: "The result for Myriad is that they still have protection for their test, however the decision also allows researchers to work with the DNA sequences that are predecessors to the cDNA used in the test." Here's an AP report on the ruling, as carried by the Washington Post.

Comments

Why is it odd?

[Eskarel]

The court case is over and the result wasn't actually all that bad. Sure Myriad and their stock holders would much rather have complete patent rights to the whole thing, but they kept the protections on their actual asset and the court case is now final and decided. Hell even if they'd lost completely their stock probably would have gone up because at least the risk was gone.

Re:Why is it odd?

[bonehead]

The result wasn't that bad, but the real question is "Why the fuck was this ever even an issue in the first place"?

Patents should be for creations, not discoveries.

The ONLY people who should be entitled to a patent on my genome is my parents, and even that is questionable.

Or, I could see a patent on genes being issued to either "God" or "The Universe", depending upon religous beliefs (or lack thereof).

But this case should have never even been allowed to waste the court's time.

Re:Why is it odd?

[Samantha Wright]

It's disastrous. cDNA is just a direct copy of the most important part of what's in the genome—the actual transcript that gets used to make the final protein. This isn't a victory at all.

Re: Why is it odd?

[Samantha Wright]

The only time cDNA occurs naturally is in the reproduction of a retrovirus or the replication of a retrotransposon. Myriad is still using the natural human sequence in their tests. This is like getting ownership of a quote from a book because you copied it into a Notepad window and then into Google, instead of just pasting it directly into Google in the first place, and then claiming it's a good way to find a certain rare edition of the e-book because it contains a typo made by the original author. It's completely and utterly intellectually dishonest.

Re:Why is it odd?

[Anonymous Coward]

The ONLY people who should be entitled to a patent on my genome is my parents, and even that is questionable.

It's probably much too late for your parents to claim a patent. If they're anything like my parents you (the invention) were publicly disclosed long before you were even born. The method used for your creation is also widely known, with an entire industry devoted to educational videos documenting many examples of the process and it's variations.

Re:Why is it odd?

[PRMan]

Yes. But you can't patent a new species of plant or animal just because you are the first to find it. Those are "natural" ie found in nature. Taking those building blocks and making a discovery with them (a tungsten wire will glow when electricity is applied to it) is worthy of patent protection, not "hey, I found this new thing called tungsten and nobody else can use it".

Be still, my heart!

[some old guy]

A breath of IP sanity from SCOTUS? And unanimously at that?

Pinch me. Surely I dream.

Re:Be still, my heart!

[UnknowingFool]

No, you're not. And don't call me Shirley.

Re:Be still, my heart!

[Hatta]

This isn't good enough. Creating cDNA is not a creative act. Extract RNA, apply a reverse transcriptase. Now you have cDNA. The sequence of the cDNA(and the protein product it codes for) is 100% determined by the sequence of the RNA, which is a natural product.

Re:Be still, my heart!

[afidel]

Perhaps a form of copyright may be more appropriate there than patent.

Oh hell no! Since copyright is DeFacto forever thanks to the MickyMouse Copyright Extension Act it would be MUCH worse if they could be granted a copyright on genes.

Re:Be still, my heart!

[dkleinsc]

Some reasons that you get unanimous SCOTUS decisions:
1. SCOTUS took the case primarily to send a strong message to current and future courts and legislatures and presidents. A lot of those kinds of decisions get handled at the circuit court level, but in future case law it's one thing to cite that the Ninth Circuit said this or the First Circuit said that, and it's another thing entirely to cite a unanimous decision by a fairly divided Supreme Court.
2. It can be a judicial smack-down when a circuit court gets something wildly wrong.
3. It could be that the Chief Justice wants to get everyone to speak with one voice on a particular issue. This usually causes decisions to take a while, as the Chief convinces the 4 holdouts to agree with the majority.

The market works on expectations

[sjbe]

Oddly, Myriad Genetics stock actually rose on that information.

That's not really surprising. All that means is that the market expected the news to be worse than it actually was. Once the ruling was handed down and the uncertainty removed, the stock rebounds based on the new information. You'll see this all the time where a company has a terrible quarter and their stock price goes up because while it was indeed terrible, it wasn't as terrible as expected.

Re:THIS MADE MY DAY!!

[Richy_T]

Do you find you often get peoples' voicemail?

Re:The bigger news here...

[clarkkent09]

Contrary to the uninformed popular opinion, Clarence Thomas has been very active during his time on the court. He just mostly leaves questions in oral arguments to other judges, which is only a small part of what judges do. It used to be common for Justices to take that approach, but recently it stands out since the others have started to enjoy the sound of their own cleverness much more, whether it contributes to the resolution of a case or not.

A thought experiment

[wbr1]

What if a company makes and patents a cDNA that is later found to also exist naturally?

Have we sequenced every variant of every species?

Case in point, Monsato make GM crops that resist herbicides. What if the parts they are patenting, have analouges in some other plant in the wild?