And wrong. It is the information that is patented. Those who spent money and time [and risked failure] in dicovering the info, have property rights to it, limited by law to something like 17 years. After that - public domain. Till then - pay for it or leave it there.
I just was granted a patent for the letter "I". I'm now shopping for my private island now.
Words fail me. Thats the most inane statement I have heard on this subject. You dont need the sequence to develop antibodies for a diagnostic. Sheesh.
I disagree. Genes should be public domain. Patent a test for a gene or a disease, yes, but the gene or disease itself, no.
Patentng treatments, processes, medications, etc is perfectly fine, those things are invented. Genes aren't invented and I don't see granting patent protection to them as necessary to encourage research.
Congress should pass a law protecting my DNA rights to compensation if a pharmaceutical company uses it to make money.
How-to is patented. Not "information". Information is normally copyrighted. Just because you discover oxygen is what you've been breathing all these years doesn't mean oxygen can legitimately be patented. The US patent office went off the deep end 10 or so years ago. It is now a huge mess. If it isn't fixed the attorneys are going to get richer and the rest of us much poorer.
We should all be outraged. As Crichton explains very well, allowing someone to patent a gene is as ridiculous as allowing someone to patent wind, or gravity. The argument that companies put a lot of money into discovering the genes? Baloney - millions of dollars are spend studying gravity too (scientists do not really know how gravity works). Patent a device that manipulates gravity? Fine. Patent "gravitons" or whatever? Ridiculous.
I plan to write my representatives and ask them to support the bill Crichton mentions, and you should too.
Why not until 75 years after the death of the "inventor" as the new RETROACTIVE "Free" Market copyright laws want it?
Another gem:
"[...]In fact, you can’t even donate your own breast cancer gene to another scientist without permission. The gene may exist in your body, but it’s now private property.[...]"
He is right in saying that this limits who can research on that Gene and that is flat wrong!