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Published online 3 December 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/456559a
Europe rejects Wisconsin's key stem-cell patent
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Wow... how nonobjective is the guideline "contrary to public order or morality." What exactly is the "public order" and whose "morality" is considered to matter? By that standard almost anything could be construed to be unpatentable. Is a pharmaceutical drug unpatentable if certain people believe its use to be immoral? I bet there are people who believe the use of Viagra and Cialis to be immoral. By this standard these drugs could be deemed unpatentable. Nonobjective law in any form is extremely dangerous, and prone to creating a path down a very slippery slope. I'm very surprised by this ruling of the EPO; I thought it was only here in the states that science policy was dominated by religionists.
I disagree with the last comment. Although the statute is vague, the EU and EPO have had a consistent philosophy that patenting and thus taking private ownership of a biopharmaceutical whose production requires the destruction of a potential human life is immoral. The decision is in keeping with their overall philosophy and this is not the first time that a broad guideline has been applied to support a specific goal. This is as true of the U.S. as it is of the EU.
Perhaps my surprise at this ruling was naive. I saw the reasoning (rejecting the patent application because the method claimed could be considered "contrary to public order or morality") as strikingly similar to the reasoning George Bush used to restrict stem cell research here in the US. In both cases, certain stem cell science was deemed immoral, and therefore government barriers were put into place to restrict it. Based on the negative response of many European postdocs in my lab to Bush's stem cell policy, I assumed that the EPO would not so strongly appeal to a religious morality regarding stem cells. But if, as Bruce suggests, this decision was consistent with previous decisions, then my assumption was wrong, and the EU is more similar to the US than I thought. I still maintain my original point though: that such vague, nonobjective law (whether in the US or EU) is very dangerous. It fosters a legal slippery slope that allows for ever more restrictions placed on science based on a religious view of morality.