The US Supreme Court rules against patenting human genes and how all superpowers fall
The Supreme Court in the United States finally ruled that human genes cannot be patented. The ruling was related to thousands of patents that are already held by companies like Myriad genetics on human genes.
The patents were challenged by scientific community members who believed that their ability to help their patients and perform more research was compromised by corporations who have patent on human genes.
As a matter of fact, the patent of Myriad Genetics on BRCA cancer gene got public attention after the famous actress Angelina Jolie got a preventive double mastectomy. The test on the cancer gene can cost patients up to $3,000 and it’s owned by Myriad Genetics. But now that the Supreme Court has ruled against patents on human gene, the price of the cancer test should come down significantly.
“A naturally occurring DNA segment is a product of nature and not patent eligible merely because it has been isolated,” Justice Clarence Thomas said. “It is undisputed that Myriad did not create or alter any of the genetic information encoded in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes”. “Groundbreaking, innovative or even brilliant discovery does not by itself satisfy the criteria” for patent eligibility, he said.
Now companies like Myriad Genetics have to face other competitors
According to USToday, Harry Ostrer, the medical geneticist said that the decision of the US Supreme Court can reduce the cost of breast and ovarian cancer test for women and make the test more available for lower income women and those without health insurance.
The USToday also mentioned that “the decision of Supreme Court represents a victory for cancer patients, researchers and geneticists who claimed that a single company's patent raised costs, restricted research and sometimes forced women to have breasts or ovaries removed without sufficient facts or second opinions”. However, with more competitors the prices could eventually end up to be not more than couple of hundred dollars.
Why the Supreme Court ruled against patenting human genes?
The decision of the Supreme Court is a huge loss for biotech and Pharmaceutical companies who have patents on plants, human DAN and animals. The Supreme Court ruling also confirms that corporations cannot have patents on human, plants and animals that are the result of the evolution in nature not the discoveries of mankind.
Although, due to corruption and corporate tyranny, Myriad Genetics could win lower courts, the truth is that they lost the Supreme Court decision that can threaten billions of dollars of investment for biotech and Pharmaceutical companies.
The Supreme Court is aware that the long term consequences of allowing few corporations to own human genes can be dramatic.
They recognize that allowing human gene to be owned by a company will have serious long-term consequences. They also realize that if they rule in favor of a handful corporations owning human gene, then they won’t be in control of anything 50 years from now. The whole idea of having a government is to have the ability to maintain in power and stay in full control of things.
The government is not any different than any other powerful organization like Mafia and no Mafia on the planet wants to lose its power and control at any cost. That’s why the governments start unnecessary and bloody wars by any means to remain in full control and power.
But as we all know, all super powers eventually fall
But one would wonder if the United States could and would surrender its exceptionalism and its arrogance by cutting down the talk of the new world order and domination? Can we stop appealing to God to bless America, over other nations? Can we end the threats of nuclear annihilation and global warming? Although American hardliners and nationalists will object, but their way has been proven not to be the way.
However, as Oliver Stone in this documentary called “The Untold History of US” says no super power will last forever and 5 major empires have collapsed in the lifetime of a person born before the WW2, Britain, France, Germany, Japan and the Soviet Union.
He also mentions that “as McCoy cautions, the illusion of technological invincibility and information on missions has failed arrogant nations in the past, as the fate of Germany in World War II and the U.S. in Vietnam attest. With tragic irony, McCoy reminds us that the U.S.'s veto of global lethality might be an equalizer for any further loss of economic strength and that the U.S.'s fate might well be determined by which comes first in this century-long cycle--military debacle from the illusion of technological mastery, or a new technological regime powerful enough to perpetuate U.S. global dominion”.
