GENET news: Human

28.03.2007

Hands off our genes, say Pacific Islanders

Pacific Islanders are demanding the power to restrict patenting of their human, plant and animal genes, even if they run foul of international patent laws. A new book documents 16 "acrimonious" encounters between scientific researchers and indigenous communities and calls for Pacific states to take a united approach to gaining control over such patents in the region.

27.03.2007

Privatizing our ’genetic commons’

Can humans be patented? Well, apparently, their cell lines can. At least that’s what one U.S agency thought. On March 14, 1995, the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) obtained a patent on the DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid, the basic constituent of the gene) of an indigenous man from the Hagahai, a people who live in a remote region of Papua New Guinea. The NIH patent established claim on a cell line in the Hagahai male which is linked to adult leukemia. The DNA, it is presumed, will assist scientists in understanding the enhancement or suppression of an immune response to a leukemia-associated virus.

15.03.2007

European patent on stem cells may be a possibility

As long as the research meets the usual requirements for a patent, isolated embryonic stem cells should be considered for both method and product patents. This conclusion, which runs counter to the views of the European Group on Ethics under the European Commission, was reached by an interdisciplinary group at the Center for Bioethics at the Karolinska Institute and Uppsala University in an academic article in the international journal Stem Cells.

16.02.2007

U.S. House panel approves ban on genetic tests for jobs, insurance

A House committee approved legislation to prevent discrimination by employers and insurers against people on the basis of genetic information. ”There is a clear need for us to pass a law to protect genetic information from discriminatory uses,” Representative George Miller, a California Democrat and chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, said before today"s unanimous voice vote by the panel.

31.01.2007

Someone (other than you) may own your genes

From the moment the first biotech patents were granted in 1980, the industry was hailed as a new frontier — uncharted territory where a new generation of scientist-inventors could reap the traditional rewards of innovation. But even as the gold rush began, critics as varied as scientists and human rights advocates declared that biotech’s new intellectual property frontier was already occupied. Claims of novelty and innovation as the basis for life patents, they said, disregarded the realities of not only nature, but also of research practices, democratic decision-making and global governance. [...] The title of an intriguing paper he wrote on the subject, «Acceptable Intellectual Property,” is a wordplay on the well-known concept of «acceptable risk” — that is, the level of risk a society considers acceptable, given existing social, economic and cultural conditions.

12.01.2007

Watchdog refuses to allow hybrid embryos

British scientists were yesterday denied permission to create controversial human-animal hybrid embryos until doubts over the ethics and scientific value of the research are addressed. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said it was deferring a decision on whether to grant licences to teams from King's College London and Newcastle University until a wide-ranging consultation on the issue concluded in the autumn.

11.01.2007

Scientists discover new, readily available source of stem cells

cientists have discovered a new source of stems cells and have used them to create muscle, bone, fat, blood vessel, nerve and liver cells in the laboratory. The first report showing the isolation of broad potential stem cells from the amniotic fluid that surrounds developing embryos was published today in Nature Biotechnology. "Our hope is that these cells will provide a valuable resource for tissue repair and for engineered organs as well," said Anthony Atala, M.D., senior researcher and director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine at Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

28.12.2006

Ottawa rejects concerns over fertility panel

Health Minister Tony Clement tried to reflect a cross-section of Canadian views when he appointed a national board to set the standards for assisted human reproduction, his spokesman said yesterday. That 10-member board, which was announced late last week to oversee Assisted Human Reproduction Canada, has been criticized as being long on socially conservative values but short on fertility experts and stem-cell researchers.

20.12.2006

Buying babies, bit by bit - An international guide to baby-making

ONE of the tests of a liberal society is whether the state stays out of the bedroom—but more than 3m people alive now were not made in bedrooms. They came into being as a result of in vitro fertilisation (IVF) under the glare of laboratory lights, with the assistance of a team of doctors, nurses and technicians. [...] Since the manufacturing of anything which is regarded as God-given—or at least natural—touches a moral nerve, governments tend to want to regulate the business. And because attitudes to the family vary from country to country, regulations about baby-making do too. Discerning baby-shoppers therefore assemble inputs from around the world—sperm from Denmark, an egg from Russia, a surrogate mother from California—to ensure that biology, for them, need not mean destiny. Some even switch countries midway through treatment, starting in Britain, say, and travelling to Russia, Spain or America at a crucial stage in the proceedings.

20.12.2006

Aussie stem cell trial wins US approval

A world-first Australian medical therapy that uses stem cells to treat degenerative spinal disease has been approved for testing on patients in the US. Researchers hope the treatment will replace painful bone grafts. A Melbourne-based biotechnology company said it had won approval from the US government for its adult stem cell treatment to be used in a major trial.

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