[LINK] some patent sanity

[Jan Whitaker]

US court rejects patents on human genes

http://www.theage.com.au/national/us-court-rejects-patents-on-human-genes-20100330-rbie.html


BRIDIE SMITH

March 31, 2010

A LANDMARK judgment handed down in the US this week on the 
contentious practice of patenting human genes is expected to send a 
message to Australian policymakers.

An Australian inquiry is considering whether to ban the granting of 
patent monopolies here.

Experts have welcomed a 156-page ruling, handed down in New York on 
Monday, which found that patents for breast and ovarian cancer genes 
should not have been awarded.

The US decision, likely to be challenged, arrives as the Senate 
community affairs committee inquiry into gene patents prepares to 
release its report on the issue in June. More than 75 submissions 
have been received.

In New York, in the first ruling of its kind, district court Judge 
Robert Sweet found the patents on human genes - considered the 
blueprints of life - were unlawful.

Central to the case was whether naturally occurring genes that were 
recreated in the laboratory could be called an invention, and 
therefore patented. Judge Sweet's findings state that this was not 
enough. Researchers needed to demonstrate that the material had been 
modified sufficiently that it performed a new function.

The ruling was welcome news for those urging the Australian 
government to update the patent law to prohibit the granting of 
patent monopolies, among them the Cancer Council, Peter MacCallum 
Cancer Centre and Australian National University patent law expert 
Luigi Palombi.
[snip]


Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
jwhit at janwhitaker.com
blog: http://janwhitaker.com/jansblog/
business: http://www.janwhitaker.com

Our truest response to the irrationality of the world is to paint or 
sing or write, for only in such response do we find truth.
~Madeline L'Engle, writer

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