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Patient wins high court challenge against company's cancer gene patent
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/oct/07/patient-wins-high-court-challenge-against-companys-cancer-gene-patentYvonne D’Arcy took US-based biotech company Myriad Genetics to court over its patent of the BRCA1 gene linked to breast and ovarian cancer
Patient wins high court challenge against company's cancer gene patent
Australian Associated Press
Tuesday 6 October 2015 20.45 EDT
A Queensland cancer patient has won her high court challenge against corporations owning human genes.
~snip~
Darcy’s lawyers had argued that genetic material is a product of nature, even where isolated from the body, and is therefore unpatentable.
They contended that allowing corporations to own patents over human genes stifled cancer research and allowed them to charge exorbitant rates for patients who wish to be tested for the BRCA1 mutation.
In an unanimous decision on Wednesday, the high court found that an isolated nucleic acid, coding for a BRCA1 protein, with specific variations from the norm that are indicative of susceptibility to breast cancer and ovarian cancer was not a “patentable invention”.