Supreme Court nixes human gene patents

Supreme Court nixes human gene patents

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court’s rejection of human gene patenting not only affirms an important ethical truth but opens the door to potential advances in medical research, supporters of the decision say.

The high court’s nine members unanimously ruled that human genes cannot be patented in a June 13 decision overturning patents already granted by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. In an opinion written by Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, the court stated, “[A] naturally occurring DNA segment is a product of nature and not patent eligible merely because it has been isolated” by a biotechnology firm.

Commenting on the ruling, Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission president Russell D. Moore said the high court “was right. Human beings didn’t create genes, and they cannot patent them.”

Myriad Genetics Inc., based in Salt Lake City, Utah, uncovered the location and order of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes and received patents as a result of those discoveries. Mutations of those genes can greatly increase the chances of breast and ovarian cancer. 

The site and sequence of those genes “existed in nature before Myriad found them,” Thomas wrote. While the Supreme Court rejected patenting of naturally occurring DNA, it upheld patents of synthetically created, or complementary, DNA (cDNA). cDNA may be patented “because it is not naturally occurring,” Thomas wrote.

The twofold ruling will provide options for cancer patients and should benefit research, observers said. “Patents generally encourage research and innovation,” bioethics expert David Prentice said in a written statement. “However, the patents on normal DNA sequences have led to limits on research to develop diagnostic tests and treatments and thus have also greatly increased the cost for tests under an exclusive license. This decision opens the field for more research and development to occur in genetics.” The court’s ruling on cDNA “could stimulate innovation in genetic research,” he also said.