

Justices Back Mayo Clinic Argument on Patents - sew
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/21/business/justices-reject-patents-for-medical-tests-relying-on-drug-dosages.html?_r=1&hp&pagewanted=all

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fruchtose
Finally.

I'm not even happy, simply relieved. It's taken years and years to _begin_
affirming what should you obvious: you shouldn't be allowed to patent nature.
It boggles the mind how it came to this, how we arrived at the notion that
someone could patent nature. Software patents are bad enough, whereas patents
on biological aspects are much more dangerous. Take gene patents--these
patents set biology back _years_ every time someone receives one.

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alexqgb
According to the Prometheus spokesperson “Without the availability of patent
protection, future health care will suffer as companies may opt out of new
research and development.”

This assumption is based on the demonstrably wrong assumption that the ONLY
motivating factor driving medical development is predatory rent-seeking of the
most odious kind. Were it not for this, the thinking goes, people would all
just suffer and die in silence.

People whose lives are seriously impacted by any condition have a serious
motivation to pool resources in an effort to find a cure. To date, the
transaction costs have been prohibitive, giving the predatory motivation more
power. But there's no reason why the Kickstarter model can't be adapted to
this problem - especially when researchers are bolstered by fundamental
research done at the NIH. An additional source of funding could come from
health insurance companies, who back promising projects because it lowers
their costs.

We need to demolish the idea that patents are the one and only pathway to
medical advance. In some ways, this is more important that going after
software patents, since any time patent reform comes up, drug patents get
wheeled out as the prime example of "good" patents. They're deployed like a
rhetorical third rail, and a useful way to shut down any conversation about
patent reform in general.

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orangecat
Exactly. The artificial scarcity imposed by patents is a hack to avoid the
tragedy of the commons, but we should be able to do better. I donate to SENS
for both altruistic and selfish reasons: if left unchecked aging will severely
impact everyone's quality of life, and in particular mine.

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Steko
"Justice Breyer rejected a proposed middle ground that had been offered by the
federal government. It had urged the court to rule that the Prometheus method
was eligible to be patented as an initial matter but could then probably be
challenged as invalid because it was obvious and insufficiently novel. "

 _sighs_

I guess unless the company was in bankruptcy and the judge ruled you couldn't
challenge their patents ala Kodak. Then having granted stupid patents in the
first place would not have been such a good idea Mr. Holder.

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nextparadigms
Why was the federal government/Holder even involved in this in the first
place? Is it his job to promote patent and copyright policies?

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ubernostrum
Well, either the federal government should stand by its existing patent
policies, or it should change them. Halfway "we know we shouldn't be doing
this but can't you just let it slide and hit it on a technicality instead"
measures really should not be an option.

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protomyth
The reasoning behind the ruling might make it a good time to try to appeal a
business process patent.

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jcampbell1
I think the ruling is correct, but someone needs to be doing this research.
Dosage research and clinical trials for non-patentable compounds needs to get
funded. I hope the federal government fixes this hole.

For instance, the FDA had to use a bullshit process to get clinical research
done on colchicine for gout. There is also some research that vitamin D
deficiency is causing many unnecessary deaths, but no ongoing clinical trials.
The status quo needs to get fixed.

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mv
Bullshit process? URL Pharma exploited a loop hole to do 'research' and a
clinical trial on a drug that has been known for _centuries_ to work (yes
centuries, the plant it is based from has been used since roman times)....
Doctors are angry because suddenly the poor patients without insurance could
no longer afford medication they need. That research was worthless, proved
what was already proven, and exploited a loophole in the FDA grandfathering
process to make a company a risk free profit.

The price went from $0.09/pill to $4.85/pill overnight.

Oh, and an easy citation is wikipedia:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colchicine>
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colchicine#Marketing_exclusivit...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colchicine#Marketing_exclusivity_in_the_United_States)

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jcampbell1
URL Pharma didn't exploit a thing. The FDA setup the program, and asked drug
companies to do the trials. It was the FDA's "Bullshit Process" that caused
the problem, not the drug company that did what they were asked.

From the article:

"That year, the FDA started their "Unapproved Drugs Initiative", through which
they sought more rigorous testing of efficacy and safety of colchicine and
other unapproved drugs on the market.[26] In exchange for paying for the
costly testing, the FDA gave URL Pharma three years of market exclusivity for
its Colcrys brand,[27] under the Hatch-Waxman Act"

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gojomo
It's a shame the NYTimes hasn't figured out how to typeset "E=mc²" correctly,
over 100 years after the original paper. (It's right in the court's decision.)

