Gene patent settlement reached between Ottawa hospital, patents' owner

The Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario says it has settled a legal dispute with the owner of five gene patents related to a potentially deadly heart rhythm disorder that runs in families.

The company, Transgenomic, has agreed to provide CHEO and all other Canadian public sector labs and hospitals the right to test Canadians for the condition — known as long QT syndrome — on a not-for-profit basis.

CHEO says the agreement resolves the immediate issue with testing for the disorder and provides a way to address gene patents more broadly.

The hospital's president and CEO Alex Munter calls the news a tremendous win for families.

In 2014, lawyers for CHEO filed a challenge in Federal Court in Ottawa, arguing genes and other segments of the human genome should not be subject to patents for commercial or any other purposes.

Hospital lawyer Nathaniel Lipkus says the new agreement will act as a model for public access to future gene patents.

Share on Google Plus

About Quang

My blog is the place to update the latest information on sports, science and technology ... If you found this article good, useful please the share for others to see, even if you want to design a ecommerce website or web edit or set a special plugin functionality, please contact us now (Information in the footer)