DNA Patents

[Rumckle]

So, I was reading an article in the paper the other day about the gene SCN1A (aka Nav1.1) being patented. Ok so, could people explain this to me, the way the article was putting it it seemed that the actual gene is patented, and any attempts to examine it, isolate it or look for it are illegal. It just doesn't make sense, if it was the treatment being patented it makes sense, but DNA? Anyone care to explain? Or even just give ranting opinions?

[Cainad (dec.)]

The right to patent DNA sequences is a fucking terrible idea and is the result of lawmakers not knowing WTF they were doing when they reworded that bit of patent law.

Since they didn't invent the fucking sequence, they shouldn't be allowed to patent it.



... IMHO

[Kai]

Yeah, its pretty wack. Crichton wrote a whole book about gene patenting.

Patents are for inventions. This isn't an invention. E/O/T

[Requia ☣]

Not the lawmakers fault in this case, unless you want to count neglect.  The USPTO is full of morons, and the handful of intelligent patent officials were shackled for a long time by a federal court ruling that said a patent application couldn't be rejected except based on information included in the application.  (think about it for a sec).  One news site was reporting that they started firing people who processed less than one patent a day (despite the 10 grand price tag to have him spend a day looking at it), even when patent applications involving multiple boxes of paper came through.

As far as the genetics thing goes, SCOTUS said back in 2007 that that shit didn't fly, but since it takes 5 million (on average) to fight off an invalid patent claim, the 50% of human DNA that is patented till fucks with everything.  And frankly, getting the federal court to pay attention to SCOTUS rulings on patents is nearly impossible.  It took *forever* to get them to uphold SCOTUS's physical machine or physical transformation process ruling.

IANAL of course.

[Requia ☣]

Ok, it appears I was horribly wrong about the SCOTUS DNA patent ruling, having read the opinion of the court, (written by Scalia  ) they sidestepped the matter of DNA patents, since the two lower courts had rejected the suit on different grounds.  Medimmune v Genentech says that you are allowed to sue to invalidate a patent even if you are currently paying royalties on the patent (thus avoiding massive risks if you lose).  The two eventually settled out of court, so no rulings that apply to genetics patents are out there as far as I know, save the old heavily ignored ones that say you can't patent a discovery.  This is what I get for trusting newspapers.