Department of Bioengineering, Institute for Biotechnology & Bioengineering, Instituto Superior Tecnico, Lisbon, Portugal.
Cancer Biol Ther. 2012 Nov;13(13):1229-34. doi: 10.4161/cbt.21958. Epub 2012 Sep 6.
Patents are issued essentially by all countries on inventions that are deemed novel, non-obvious, clearly described and of significant utility or industrial application. The only exceptions to patenting an invention are abstract ideas, laws of nature and natural phenomena, although the exceptions vary depending on countries where moral, public order or human rights considerations are also taken into account. Although patent laws are updated over decades, the rapid progress of science creates situations that the patent laws on the book cannot address, leading to contentious legal issues. This is often true for life saving drugs, particularly drugs for cancers or HIV/AIDS, which are expensive and beyond the reach of poor people because of the proprietary positions of these patented drugs. Another contentious issue is the patent eligibility of human genes and mutations that are often thought of nature's contribution to human health and propagation and should be beyond the reach of patentability. In this review, we address some of these current legal issues and their implications for the development of diagnostic methods, therapeutic interventions and even prevention for cancer, a scourge of mankind.
专利通常由所有国家向具有新颖性、非显而易见性、清晰描述性和重大实用性或工业应用价值的发明授予。授予发明专利的唯一例外是抽象思想、自然规律和自然现象，尽管例外情况因考虑道德、公共秩序或人权因素的国家而异。尽管专利法在几十年中不断更新，但科学的快速进步会产生书中的专利法无法解决的情况，从而导致有争议的法律问题。对于救命药物，尤其是治疗癌症或艾滋病的药物来说，这通常是真实的，因为这些专利药物的专有权地位，这些药物昂贵且超出了穷人的承受能力。另一个有争议的问题是人类基因和突变的专利资格，这些基因和突变通常被认为是对人类健康和繁衍的自然贡献，不应该受到专利性的限制。在这篇综述中，我们讨论了其中的一些当前法律问题及其对癌症诊断方法、治疗干预甚至预防的发展的影响，癌症是人类的一大祸害。
