Members of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and the Stanford University in Palo Alto and their colleagues looked at the case of two patented mutations associated with hereditary haemochromatosis, a disease where a person absorbs too much iron from food. In the US, about one person in 200 develops the disease, which can be fatal, and about one in 10 is a carrier. It is easily treatable by regular bloodletting. The discovery of the gene mutations was reported in 1996 and many US labs began testing for the condition. A patent was awarded two years later and SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories, which by then owned the patent, soon began enforcing it. It wrote to labs offering to grant sublicences for fees ranging from $25,000 to $250,000, plus royalties of $20 per test. In 1999, the group from Pennsylvania approached 128 laboratories that were capable of offering the test and asked what effect the patent enforcement had had. The researchers found that 26 per cent of the labs surveyed had decided not to provide the test, and four per cent said they had stopped offering it, all because of patenting issues. This is an example of how by keeping standard genetic tests out of reach to many laboratories and would subsequently have bad effects on for not only health care, but also clinical research and quality control. If patents are keeping diagnostic tests out of labs, quality of testing could suffer because laboratories traditionally exchange samples with each other to check quality. Fewer laboratories are now doing the tests meaning fewer researchers accumulate knowledge about genes.5
Gene patenting may also hinder progress to help people in the third world. In 1992 a US company was granted a patent over all genetically engineered cotton. The company used a bacterium to transfer genes into the cotton plant, but the patent meant that the company also had rights over cotton produced using other genetic engineering techniques. In 1994, the same company was awarded a similar patent in Europe over soya beans. Such wide-reaching patents discourage research by other geneticists into both species and could prevent poor countries from trying to improve these crops and solve local pest problems through genetic engineering.3
Patenting a discovery can also slow down the transfer of information between scientists. It can take many months for a country’s patent office to decide whether to grant a patent. During this time, the scientist cannot talk about his or her discovery at a conference, or publish the results, because the research might be copied before it is protected by a patent. This means that announcements about important new discoveries can be delayed. Scientists may waste time and money trying to discover things that have already been discovered elsewhere. Or they may have to stop work on something because they find that it is already protected by a patent.3
Gene patenting also came close to destroying the Human Genome Project. By 1991, around 2500 genes had been mapped onto the genome. Scientists from all around the world were working together towards a common goal. However that year, hope was replaced by suspicion. The US National Institute of Health applied for patents on 347 pieces of DNA identified by its researchers and by the summer of 1992, they had tried to patent 6000 pieces of DNA. The British Medical Research Council responded by applying for 1100 fragments. Luckily, the US Patent Office rejected the NIH applications on the grounds that the DNA pieces were neither new nor useful. While patents were being considered, geneticists were forced to keep their discoveries secret, so wasted time in trying to map genes that had already been mapped. In 1994 both sides withdrew their applications but the project had been damaged by the bad feeling and the goal of finding the 100000 human genes was slowed down if not for the patent wars.3
The move by the US Patent Office in 1997 is surely the most outrageous thing surrounding the issue of gene patenting is that genes can be patented before any proven, specific use has been established for them, something that will hold back medical advances.2 It is doubtful that allowing the patenting of DNA sequences without additional utility proofs would be beneficial to anyone other than persons who have such applications pending.4
In 1975, two Cambridge scientists discovered how to make monoclonal antibodies. Doctors knew that the ability to make large numbers of a single antibody could be very useful in medicine. Because each type of antibody recognises only a single, specific type of antigen, monoclonal antibodies could be used to identify abnormal proteins in the body or could be attached to powerful drugs and used to carry the drugs to diseased cells. Until the discovery there was no way to make monoclonal antibodies in large amounts. By fusing together cells that made antibodies with cells that live forever, the result was an endless supply of identical monoclonal antibodies. The discovery was not patented and British research missed out on millions of pounds in patent charges but monoclonal antibodies are now widely used in medicine.3
In my opinion, the cost of treatments because of drug companies patenting gene sequences will be unreachable for much of the world population. The best idea would be to ban patenting of genes and for funding for medical research to be paid for by a tax on the drug companies themselves. Gene patenting is just another example of capitalism destroying the planet and the moral implications should not be forgotten either. The genes do not belong to the person who discovered them, they belong to the human race as a whole, it is as if that person owns a part of us.
1The Penguin Dictionary of Biology – Thain, Hickman, 2000
2Guardian Unlimited, http://www.guardian.co.uk – Meek, 2000
3Genetic Engineering – Bryan, 1995
4Academic Medicine Online – Scherer, 2002
5New Scientist – Motluk, 2002