I am surprised that this science-culture-ethics research paper seems to have gotten some traction on the net. I read a science news fed most days and often think, well that story is going to get a lot of attention, and other than a couple science bloggers, the story fails to generate much buzz. You Don’t “Own” Your Own Genes. Researchers Raise Alarm about Loss of Individual “Genomic Liberty” Due to Gene Patents That May Impact the Era of Personalized Medicine
Humans don’t “own” their own genes, the cellular chemicals that define who they are and what diseases they might be at risk for. Through more than 40,000 patents on DNA molecules, companies have essentially claimed the entire human genome for profit, report two researchers who analyzed the patents on human DNA. Their study, published March 25 in the journal Genome Medicine, raises an alarm about the loss of individual “genomic liberty.”
In their new analysis, the research team examined two types of patented DNA sequences: long and short fragments. They discovered that 41 percent of the human genome is covered by longer DNA patents that often cover whole genes. They also found that, because many genes share similar sequences within their genetic structure, if all of the “short sequence” patents were allowed in aggregate, they could account for 100 percent of the genome.
Furthermore, the study’s lead author, Dr. Christopher E. Mason of Weill Cornell Medical College, and the study’s co-author, Dr. Jeffrey Rosenfeld, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey and a member of the High Performance and Research Computing Group, found that short sequences from patents also cover virtually the entire genome — even outside of genes.
“If these patents are enforced, our genomic liberty is lost,” says Dr. Mason, an assistant professor of physiology and biophysics and computational genomics in computational biomedicine at the Institute for Computational Biomedicine at Weill Cornell. “Just as we enter the era of personalized medicine, we are ironically living in the most restrictive age of genomics. You have to ask, how is it possible that my doctor cannot look at my DNA without being concerned about patent infringement?”
The U.S. Supreme Court will review genomic patent rights in an upcoming hearing on April 15. At issue is the right of a molecular diagnostic company to claim patents not only on two key breast and ovarian cancer genes — BRCA1 and BRCA2 — but also on any small sequence of code within BRCA1, including a striking patent for only 15 nucleotides.
In its study, the research team matched small sequences within BRCA1 to other genes and found that just this one molecular diagnostic company’s patents also covered at least 689 other human genes — most of which have nothing to do with breast or ovarian cancer; rather, its patents cover 19 other cancers as well as genes involved in brain development and heart functioning.
“This means if the Supreme Court upholds the current scope of the patents, no physician or researcher can study the DNA of these genes from their patients, and no diagnostic test or drug can be developed based on any of these genes without infringing a patent,” says Dr. Mason.
One Patented Sequence Matched More Than 91 Percent of Human GenesDr. Mason undertook the study because he realized that his research into brain and cancer disorders inevitably involved studying genes that were protected by patents.
Under U.S. patent law, genes can be patented by those researchers, either at companies or institutions, who are first to find a gene that promises a useful application, such as for a diagnostic test. For example, the patents received by a company in the 1990s on BRCA1 and BRCA2 enables it to offer a diagnostic test to women who may have, or may be at risk for, breast or ovarian cancer due to mutations in one or both of these genes. Women and their doctors have no choice but to use the services of the patents’ owner, which costs $3,000 per test, “whereas any of the hundreds of clinical laboratories around the country could perform such a test for possibly much less,” says Dr. Mason.
The impact on these patents is equally onerous on research, Dr. Mason adds.
“Almost every day, I come across a gene that is patented — a situation that is common for every geneticist in every lab,” says Dr. Mason.
Dr. Mason and his research partner sought to determine how many other genes may be impacted by gene patents, as well as the overall landscape of intellectual property on the human genome.
The general argument in favor of patenting genes is that some companies cannot make a profit off their research without a patent. This will come out of the mouths of Fox News talking heads as we’re all gonna die if you don’t have patents on genes. What researchers should be making a profit from is the treatment regime, if anything. To see how this gene patenting plays out just look at Monsanto’s patents on seeds. It does not look evil on the very front end. You buy some patented seeds that they created to survive being sprayed with the weed killer, that they also patented. The problem is that nature does not respect seed patents. The pollen containing the patented genes are blown into the field of someone who did not buy the patented seeds. That farmer cannot harvest that crop without paying Monsanto because the wind blew some of their genes into his/her field. The farmer that did not buy the patented seeds because the economic prisoner of Monsanto. Are cancer patients going to become the economic prisoners of companies that own the gene that requires a gene therapy on the patented genes. Monsanto also claims that in order to make a profit they must patent those genes. Simply put, I don’t care if Monsanto goes out of business and gee, I don ‘t know, we find a way to plant wheat, corn soy beans or whatever, like we did before Monsanto came along and got American, and increasingly European farmers into this cycle of dependence on them because of their weed killer. It is not the least been hyperbolic or melodramatic to say that if a corporation owns our genes they own life. Congress will never let it come to that? They already have by allowing the patenting of human genes and letting Monsanto claim they own even accidentally pollinated crops that have their genes in them.
inkbluesky 