Biologists vs. Genetic IP Laws

An Anonymous Coward writes: "An article in the NYTimes discusses a recent international treaty aimed at protecting countries against 'recent efforts by some companies to commercialize substances from tropical plants and animals without seeking permission or paying royalties.' The treaty makes it almost impossible for honest biologists to collect samples or even conduct studies of indigenous wildlife. In some cases biologists with permits have been detained and their samples destroyed."

parallels with freedom of speech

[PD]

There is a parallel here with free speech I think. It seems that the restriction was against people who did research in the forest for the purpose of making money, but not against those who wanted to do basic research. But the restriction backfired, and now everyone is finding it difficult to get into the forest at all for any reason.

Seems like speech is the same way. Restrict it for some purposes, and before you know it, nobody can speak freely.

Let the dishonest biologists take a crack at it

[Caractacus Potts]

These countries (and ours) can't even stop smugglers from transporting live animals not to mention agricultural products. Just get the locals interested in your "cause", and a black market will suddenly appear. After that, just complain bitterly about the black market and blame it on the ill-conceived bans.

Even patents on human stem cells?

[CyberQ]

To take it even further: The EU ethics group [eu.int] has just published a report recommending that stem cells that have been modified should be pantentable (internationally).

The Group considers that only human stem cells lines which have been modified by an inventive process to get new characteristics for specific industrial application are patentable. However, that stem cell which are been isolated and cultured but which have not been modified should not be considers as patentable inventions. Quoting from the press statement. [eu.int]

The full report is available here [eu.int] (here).

It's Only Fair

[mdielmann]

I look at it the same way that I look at IP on human genes. If some poor schmuck has a genetic disease, and they use him as a guinea pig to figure out exactly what gene causes the disease, why should he be the only person in the chain that doesn't get compensated? The scientists get their wage, possibly much more, the company gets patents, and the potential revenue from the implementation of them, and this guy might get the chance to pay big coin for a treatment that he was instrumental in delivering.
No, look at it from the perspective of a poor country whose only real value is their natural, indigenous, resources. Why should they give them up for a medication that they probably won't be able to afford? Then, to add insult to injury, we try to get them to not destroy these resources for little things like farmland to feed their people.

So, yeah, good for them. If these scientists/companies want to take samples on the chance that something miraculous will come of it, they should start taking risks a little earlier, and paying these countries for the resources they are stewards of. Or, give them a stake in any patents that come out of it (with the royalties and profits to match). And if they don't like that, them leave that plant there and go home.

do substances *derived* from living things count?

[CowbertPrime]

For example, a more recent article [slashdot.org] talks about the genome of an actinomycete fully sequenced. There have been many many antibiotics that were isolated from various organisms (the most famous was notably Alexander Fleming's overgrown moldy petri dish with zones of inhibition). Did he ever run into IP issues, patents, etc? I don't think so... Drug companies surely expect some sort of compensation for sending a Sean Connery look-alike out into the rainforest....