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Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

arstechnica.com

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Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#81

Post by epmatsw »

icanhackit wrote: post #75

Looking at some of the for and against arguments regarding patents, let's play a mental game: would new, valuable things still be created if the patent system didn't exist? I think yes. The creator wouldn't necessarily benefit directly, but in a way we all indirectly benefit from new technology and ideas. Much the same as it would be better for the poor to have free or affordable essential health care, our society wo…

I think that's a misleading question. I don't think anyone is arguing that all innovation would go away if the patent system was removed. However, it seems possible that innovations that require high initial investment and low ongoing costs (medications, gene patents, etc.) would be produced at a lower rate if the incentives the current system provides were removed.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#82

Post by teekert »

doki_pen wrote: post #72
ekianjo wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not true at all. Look at Bio drugs for example. Even when they are to be generiqued, there is almost no company jumping in to make them because it's damn hard to make in the first place and there is very little incentive to do so, so the major players stay in place. A good example: all injectable diabetes drugs, but there are others out there as well.

Absurd, the price of albuterol has gone up 10 fold since patents have been reinforced on it. When companies have patents on life saving drugs they can charge whatever they want. If they have no patent, they are forced to keep the price low enough so no one wants to compete.

You do understand that the profits go partly back into making new drugs? And also partly into paying people with families?

Again: I understand the need for keeping medicines cheap but the removal of patents seems like an overkill with adverse effects.

> If they have no patent, they are forced to keep the price low enough so no one wants to compete. ... And no one feels like inventing a new drug that will immediately be copied and sold at a price near that of the raw materials (the only overhead is the factory) making it impossible to pay all the scientists who are working on the next drug.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#83

Post by danarmak »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #58
teekert wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are completely ignoring the fact that large Pharma companies would be unable to have any return on investment, would not be able to pay their employees and thus many people would be unemployed and there would thus be no incentive to even develop new drugs.

I think drug development is one of the strongest cases for a patent system. However: > many people would be unemployed This isn't an argument at all. It's better for people to be unemployed than to be employed in an enterprise that makes everyone else worse off. > and there would thus be no incentive to even develop new drugs Of course there would. We had drug development before we had patents.

> We had drug development before we had patents.

How is that? We've had patents for centuries; we've had drug development for maybe one century.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#84

Post by refurb »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #58
teekert wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are completely ignoring the fact that large Pharma companies would be unable to have any return on investment, would not be able to pay their employees and thus many people would be unemployed and there would thus be no incentive to even develop new drugs.

I think drug development is one of the strongest cases for a patent system. However: > many people would be unemployed This isn't an argument at all. It's better for people to be unemployed than to be employed in an enterprise that makes everyone else worse off. > and there would thus be no incentive to even develop new drugs Of course there would. We had drug development before we had patents.

Of course there would. We had drug development before we had patents.

Really? Can you provide an example?

From what I understand patents started in the US shortly after formation of the country. The first drugs discovered didn't happen until the late 1800's.

In fact, the names of many of these drugs were "Dr. Smith's patented flu medication".

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#85

Post by danarmak »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #60
JulianMorrison wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People's incentive to create is the same as it always was: creative people just want to. What patents were set up to prevent, IIRC, was trade secrets - they were a way to bribe creators to publish their ideas rather than sit on them. IMO, they were a sledgehammer to swat a fly. Trade secrets would be reinvented. Locking an idea out of the commons for a whole patent term (and longer if they can attach new patents off…

> What patents were set up to prevent, IIRC, was trade secrets - they were a way to bribe creators to publish their ideas rather than sit on them. This is what I learned too. I can't for the life of me understand why the US has trade secret laws in addition to the patent laws. From some light reading on wikipedia, the answer seems to be "why do we need a reason?"

For that matter, software or algorithms can be under copyright (may not publish), patent (must publish as part of the patent), and trade secret (may publish only if already public knowledge) at the same time.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#86

Post by icanhackit »

epmatsw wrote: post #81
icanhackit wrote: post #75

Looking at some of the for and against arguments regarding patents, let's play a mental game: would new, valuable things still be created if the patent system didn't exist? I think yes. The creator wouldn't necessarily benefit directly, but in a way we all indirectly benefit from new technology and ideas. Much the same as it would be better for the poor to have free or affordable essential health care, our society wo…

I think that's a misleading question. I don't think anyone is arguing that all innovation would go away if the patent system was removed. However, it seems possible that innovations that require high initial investment and low ongoing costs (medications, gene patents, etc.) would be produced at a lower rate if the incentives the current system provides were removed.

it seems possible that innovations that require high initial investment and low ongoing costs (medications, gene patents, etc.) would be produced at a lower rate

Good point, I don't necessarily disagree. But is a lot of the R&D to get around existing patents, rather than build a new thing entirely? In the software world I think we can safely say yes. Regarding medical research I'm not qualified to say. I'd love to hear from anyone with some insight.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#87

Post by epmatsw »

icanhackit wrote: post #86
epmatsw wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a misleading question. I don't think anyone is arguing that all innovation would go away if the patent system was removed. However, it seems possible that innovations that require high initial investment and low ongoing costs (medications, gene patents, etc.) would be produced at a lower rate if the incentives the current system provides were removed.

it seems possible that innovations that require high initial investment and low ongoing costs (medications, gene patents, etc.) would be produced at a lower rate Good point, I don't necessarily disagree. But is a lot of the R&D to get around existing patents, rather than build a new thing entirely? In the software world I think we can safely say yes. Regarding medical research I'm not qualified to say. I'd love to he…

That's an interesting counterpoint. I honestly don't know the answer either.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#88

Post by norea-armozel »

doki_pen wrote: post #70
ekianjo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we could kill patents altogether that would be a much nicer step. Patents are an invention from another Era and make absolutely no sense nowadays, and we see them constantly abused to make our lives worse in the end.

Not true. Patents increase the incentive for people to do hard research and development. Whether or not that increased incentive is necessary is debatable.

That may be true, but the current setup in the US at least cost us 500 billion over a decade in litigation alone. Something in our system has to be reworked to minimize the social cost of innovation.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#89

Post by stillsut »

Patents are a trade: you get an 18 year monopoly for public disclosure of how your innovation works.

In societies that lack patent protection, much innovation becomes a trade secret guarded against public use for generations, think China and the silk trade.

By removing patents, you remove the incentive to make public how your medicine works. That, actually sounds scarier to me than temporary price mark ups.

Re: Gene patents probably dead worldwide following Australian court decision

#90

Post by crpatino »

teekert wrote: post #63
thaumasiotes wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think drug development is one of the strongest cases for a patent system. However: > many people would be unemployed This isn't an argument at all. It's better for people to be unemployed than to be employed in an enterprise that makes everyone else worse off. > and there would thus be no incentive to even develop new drugs Of course there would. We had drug development before we had patents.

> This isn't an argument at all. It's better for people to be unemployed than to be employed in an enterprise that makes everyone else worse off. Are you hinting at a specific company? I don't think the people that got cured from metastatic cancer would agree that they would be better of without Merck and their PD-L1 antibodies. To be clear I'm responding to ekianjo's > If we could kill patents altogether that would…

> I don't think the people that got cured from metastatic cancer would agree that they would be better of without Merck and their PD-L1 antibodies.

Of course they wouldn't; its the relatives of all those who could not afford the drug and died who would be all-in for this!

And you seem to believe that the Free Hand of Market does magically fix every problem. Not so. It is just a Hand after all, with no eyes and no brain.

Big companies have their own share of inefficiencies. Maybe is not as bad as in the public sector, but they are far from working at full capacity. And whatever advantage private sector has you have to offset against the potential for corporate malfeasance. With corrupt public officials at least you know they limit themselves to trying to get rich and providing good paying jobs for their friends. In the private sector you give executives the chance to do the same thing legally, and then they go on to weaponize the patent system and actively block any progress (in house AND from external competitors) that is perceived to threaten a revenue stream.

Ultimately the people that count, the intellectual powerhouses that carry the weight of everybody else, are the same ones that you've dismissed as hobbyist. They are the only ones that care about the drugs themselves, and they care enough to do it even if nobody pays them, as long as they are not busy trying not to starve to dead. They usually don't care where their paycheck comes from (grants, profits, venture capital, etc), and as long as all their needs and reasonable wants are provided for they continue to perform their magic.

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