Monday, April 15, 2013

Who owns your genes?? (not Jeans, Genes.)

Read the Article Below and you must pick a side from the article and defend it.  This post requires a 3 sentence minimum.  Use other peoples opposing views as motivation for you view if you see fit.  (Be appropriate and polite.)



Supreme Court weighs whether human genes can be patented

Published April 15, 2013

Associated Press

DNA may be the building block of life, but can something taken from it also be the building block of a multimillion-dollar medical monopoly? 

The Supreme Court grapples Monday with the question of whether human genes can be patented. Its ultimate answer could reshape U.S. medical research, the fight against diseases like breast and ovarian cancer and the multi-billion dollar medical and biotechnology business. 

"The intellectual framework that comes out of the decision could have a significant impact on other patents -- for antibiotics, vaccines, hormones, stem cells and diagnostics on infectious microbes that are found in nature," Robert Cook-Deegan, director for genome ethics, law & policy at Duke University, said in a statement. 

"This could affect agricultural biotechnology, environmental biotechnology, green-tech, the use of organisms to produce alternative fuels and other applications," he said. 
The nine justices' decision will also have a profound effect on American business, with billions of dollars of investment and years of research on the line. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has been awarding patents on human genes for almost 30 years. 

And Myriad Genetics alone has $500 million invested in the patents being argued over in this case. Without the ability to recoup that investment, breakthrough scientific discoveries needed to combat all kind of medical maladies wouldn't happen, the company says. 

"Countless companies and investors have risked billions of dollars to research and develop scientific advances under the promise of strong patent protection," said Peter D. Meldrum, the president and CEO of Myriad Genetics, in a statement. 

But their opponents argue that allowing companies like Myriad to patent human genes or parts of human genes will slow down or cripple lifesaving medical research like in the battle against breast cancer. 

"What that means is that no other researcher or doctor can develop an additional test, therapy or conduct research on these genes," said Karuna Jagger, executive director of Breast Cancer Action. 
The Supreme Court has already said that abstract ideas, natural phenomena and laws of nature cannot be given a patent, which gives an inventor the right to prevent others from making, using or selling a novel device, process or application. 

Myriad's case involves patents on two genes linked to increased risk of breast and ovarian cancer. Myriad's BRACAnalysis test looks for mutations on the breast cancer predisposition gene, or BRCA. Those mutations are associated with much greater risks of breast and ovarian cancer. 

Women with a faulty gene have a three to seven times greater risk of developing breast cancer and a higher risk of ovarian cancer. Men can also carry a BRCA mutation, raising their risk of prostate, pancreatic and other types of cancer. 

The mutations are most common in people of eastern European Jewish descent. 
Myriad sells the only BRCA gene test. 

The American Civil Liberties Union challenged Myriad's patents, arguing that genes couldn't be patented, and in March 2010 a New York district court agreed. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has now twice ruled that genes can be patented. In Myriad's case, it's because the isolated DNA has a "markedly different chemical structure" from DNA within the body. 

Mark C. Capone, president of Myriad Genetics Laboratories, Inc., a subsidiary of Myriad, said some of the concerns over what they have patented are overblown and some simply incorrect. 
"Myriad cannot, should not and has not patented genes as they exist in the human body on DNA," Capone said in an interview. "This case is truly about isolated DNA molecules which are synthetic chemicals created by the human ingenuity of man that have very important clinical utilities, which is why this was eligible for a patent." 
But the ACLU is arguing that isolating the DNA molecules doesn't stop them from being DNA molecules, which they say aren't patentable. 

"Under this theory, Hans Dehmelt, who won the Nobel Prize for being the first to isolate a single electron from an atom, could have patented the electron itself," said Christopher A. Hansen, the ACLU's lawyer in court papers. "A kidney removed from the body (or gold extracted from a stream) would be patentable subject matter." 

The Obama administration seems to agree. Artificially created DNA can be patented, but "isolated but otherwise unmodified genomic DNA is not patent-eligible," Solicitor General Donald Verrilli said in court papers. 
That was the ruling of the original judge who looked at Myriad's patents after they were challenged by the ACLU in 2009.  U.S. District Judge Robert Sweet said he invalidated the patents because DNA's existence in an isolated form does not alter the fundamental quality of DNA as it exists in the body or the information it encodes. But the federal appeals court reversed him in 2011, saying Myriad's genes can be patented because the isolated DNA has a "markedly different chemical structure" from DNA within the body. 

The Supreme Court threw out that decision and sent the case back to the lower courts for rehearing. This came after the 
high court unanimously threw out patents on a Prometheus Laboratories, Inc., test that could help doctors set drug doses for autoimmune diseases like Crohn's disease, saying the laws of nature are unpatentable. 
But the federal circuit upheld Myriad's patents again in August, leading to the current review. The court will rule before the end of the summer. 

"The key issue now for the court will therefore be whether the scientist working in the lab to isolate a particular gene innovated in a way that allows for that isolated gene to be patented," said Bruce Wexler, a lawyer with the law firm Paul Hastings, who advises pharmaceutical and biotech companies on patent issues. 
The case is 12-398, Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc.


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/04/15/supreme-court-weighs-whether-human-genes-can-be-patented/print#ixzz2QYFoNXVz

39 comments:

  1. I don't think genes should be able to be patented. Doing so, will mean no other doctor, researcher, etc. will be able to examine the patented gene. This is not good because then no other person can help solve a problem with the gene.

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  2. I think that ethically, genes shouldn't be patented. Practically, however, I think it could be beneficial. As Jennifer stated, it does limit the number of scientists able to research, but in some aspects this could be beneficial. For example, if there 100 genes to study and 100 scientists to study them, it is more productive to have each scientist gain extensive knowledge of one gene as opposed to each scientist having a limited knowledge of all of the genes.

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  3. I think this makes sense. This is how life works. Not everything is fair, even if it is for the best. Life isn't fair.

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  4. Many things can go wrong on patenting a gene. It limits one gene to one scientist, they could probably miss something and not know about it. Having more scientist on a gene can possibly detect the mistake of the first scientist.

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  5. I don't think genes should be patened because then no one else could perform or help with the research. The person who does paten the genes may not find everything that can be known like another scientist can. It'd be better if others were aloud to examine and praticipate with the findings and practices.

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  6. I agree with Joseph. Scientist throughout history have been perfecting each other, making changes to their discoveries. If there is a patent on genes, no other scientist with be able to do further, possibly better, the research.

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  7. I don't think genes should patented because only one scientist can work on it. This would also be bad because it is sometimes a good thing to have other people's opinions on things and if patens are allowed then that can't happen

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  8. In my opinion, genes could patented. DNA makes the cells function, which make up a unique and alive person. Furthermore, cancer mostly caused by the damaging of DNA. Therefore, if a scientist could make a further study and more in depths about genes, then there will be a stronger cancer prevention. A patent on genes can also considered as the scientific competition between the genius.

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  9. I'd say it shouldn't be patented. We don't know if they are hiding anything under these genes. It's basically like, I can patent atoms because I isolated it from everything else. Plus, if only Myriad can only conduct research, then how about everyone else? Nobody will know what they will be doing in those labs while researching. Also, there could be mistakes made that won't be able to be pointed out by someone else. They should be able to patent only if the gene can add a unique ability to a human.

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  10. Wow, Well this isn't surprising in the least to make profit of DNA. I don't think the government should make human genes patent. Allowing DNA to be patent could slow down the research for cures for cancers, genetic diseases, and other incurable diseases. Though it would increase the rate which they could find more cures it won't benefit if they just hinder each others research.

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  11. I honestly don't feel that they should patent it. Like everyone else said, every scientist was perfected by another scientist after them. It's the same today someone else could perfect their work.
    -Sara Hamblin

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  12. I do not think genes should be patented. If a gene is patented, less research is legally allowed on the gene. If research can't be done, then there is no point in even using the gene for cures. I think that genes should not be patented, because if they are, it will stunt the growth of knowledge of the properties of the gene and make it less scientifically valuable.

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  13. I don't think genes should be patented. Like everyone else has said, it would really limit the ideas and research that many scientists could provide. I think there are definitely more con's than pro's in this situation.

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  14. I agree with many of my classmates that genes should not be patented. According to the article, the opponent had argue that patenting human genes "will slow down or cripple lifesaving medical research like in the battle against breast cancer." This would be horrible for those who are in that situation. I believe that this idea may be risky. The reason is there may be lack of information found on genes (less research). I think genes should not be patented.

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  15. I would have to agree with everyone else when they said that genes should not be patented. Like what Linda had said above, it would be too risky since they may have lack of information. They may also be dangerous since some scientist may not identify the genes.

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  16. By allowing genes to become patented, the government is endorsing medical research as a means to make money rather than to find cures and solutions to the ever-growing number of medical problems in today's world. Think of it this way; has anyone ever put a patent on a specific type of chair that forbid anyone else to recreate it? The answer is no. Chairs, like genes, are abundant and it would be dumb to allow exclusively one company or research group to analyze a set of genes. If a successful cure were to be found by a group that invested millions upon millions of dollars to be the sole researchers of that specific gene, then they would make much money. This is understandable. But doing so would ultimately slow down the rate of new discoveries within the medical field. I also feel research would grind to a sluggish pace due to the reason that scientists would have to go through the task of making sure a patent has not been passed on the gene that they are analyzing. They would have to work under the constant pressure of making sure that they aren't using someone else's property/ideas. As the article states, Hans Dehmelt could have patented the electron itself under this theory. Imagine if this were the case. No additional tests would have been done on the electron and many things we know today would not have been possible. Genes/DNA should not be patented.

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  17. I don't think the scientist should patent their work. I believe this because many other scientist can help them perfect their work. I believe if the scientist patent their work no one will be able to make it better and someone may be able to help cure someone with their theory.

    ps. Linh Nguyen Says hi :)

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  18. I do not think scientists should patent their work. One because their are other scientist that could have noticed a mistake that one did not see but that would not be possible. Second other scientist could not use another experiment with gene and this would be bad because their theory could actually work for another cure.

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  19. I dont agree on the scientist patenting their work. If they do, it eliminates other ideas to help their work be better. That would mess up the chances of finding a cure for something.
    -Samary P

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  20. An interestion idea, but the overall idea can still harsh concequences like slowing treatment research. Some work and this could be a huge advancement…or a significant step back.

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  21. In my opinion, I don't think scientists should put a patent on their work. If they did that other scientists will not have the ability to edit or make even better previous scientists discoveries. So, I agree with most of my classmates.

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  22. I think genes should not be patented. Many scientists have worked on things threw the past and corrected them. Then this is enableing the other scientists to correct them.

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  23. I think that scientist should not patent there work. It affects future work and cures for scientists then it should not be allowed. Everyone should be allow to work on them not just one group of scientists or people.

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  24. Like many of my classmates have already said, I don't agree with it. If they patented the idea than other scientist can't help make it better. This messes the process up of possibly finding a cure for a disease.

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  25. In my opinion, I don't think genes should be patented. Like everyone else has said, it would really limit the ideas and research that many scientists could provide.

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  26. I think that having a patened gene could be bad. If you want more ideas on research of that gene how could you? You own the gene but cant do further more research on it. So if you get stuck on the gene then your screwed.

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  27. I say no because it could be something bad, and cause troubles between scientists and their discoveries. It could maybe be something good but it seems like it mostly is bad and interfere with other cures.

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  28. I don't think genes should be patented. If they paten their work then nobody can help correct mistakes they did or suggest opinions to make it better. If they don't paten their work then it will give them a chance to learn from there mistakes so they can become better scientists.

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  29. In my opinion, it should not be patented. That means it wouldn't be beneficial to other scientist. Mistakes would be made and no one would be able to correct it. Cures and theories would not be able to be shared or corrected.

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  30. Yea I believe scientists should be able to patent there work, but others should be able to work with their discovery and improve it.

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  31. I am very firm on my view of this and say NO!! My mom has had breast cancer and this hits home for me in many ways, perhaps if we are or were able to patent then my mom may not be here now because of live saving research doctors have done to help regress cancer cells. scientist should be allowed to continue to research and continue to keep pushing forward in the cure of cancer among other disease ( auto immune etc.)

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  32. I think that it should not be patented because then it would give other scientists a chance to discover the work. Also there could be major problems and cause something to go wrong, for example for scientists to find a cure for diseases etc.

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  33. Although I think it's a unique idea I don't think scientist should patent their work because like Kyler Bartz said the con's definitely outweigh the pro's. If scientist were to place a patent on their work it would definitely limit the possibilities of new discoveries and ideas. It also seems a little selfish to patent your own work because many things can go wrong and there's a higher chance of errors occurring.

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  34. I believe that they should not have a patin on science. The reason being is because scientist aren't 100% accurate and they need to have people help them out and if they have a patin then no one else can help them. They aren't always right and they need help some point in time with their projects.

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  35. I don't think genes should be able to be patented. If only a certain doctor owned the right to research a certain gene, nothing would get accomplished. It would take forever to figure out certain traits and such of the gene if only one person could experiment with it. Everybody thinks a differentway so popossibilities and research would be limited to the ideas of the owner.

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  36. I dont think they should be able to be patented. if they paten there work it could limit the discoveries of other genes and scientific ideas. Altho it is unique i dobt think it is a good idea

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  37. Genes should not be able to be patent because they would hurt the scientific advancement because doctors will have to atent genes.

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  38. I don't think scientist should patent their work. This is because other scientists studying the same medicine could correct a mistake the other didn't see. Also they couldn't make it better if the genes were to be patent.
    ~Iris Ross

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  39. Briseida Resendiz chem. 6hr

    Genes should be an available research to anyone. The more people working on genes and trying to find cures, the quicker it is to find solutions to what hinders our human health. Genes should not be patented. If they were to become patented then that would limit the many possible discoveries we could have found long ago. Having genes un-patented would make it quicker and easier with research and it would alu8d other researchers to correct and improve their research with other researchers.

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