Surprising decision from The Supreme Court

If you're a news junkie or a reader of several political blogs, You've probably seen this before now - it's a few days late. But the Supremes ruled on one in favor of the people and against big business.

From The Raw Story
(Click on the link to read more)

Supreme Court nixes DNA patenting for companies
By David Ferguson
Thursday, June 13, 2013

The U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision Thursday morning saying that biotech companies and pharmaceutical manufacturers cannot patent configurations of Deoxyribonucleic Acid, also known as DNA. According to the decision in the case of Association for Molecular Pathology, et al. v. United States Patent and Trademark Office, et al., companies cannot own DNA, even if they are the first to discover and isolate it.

The decision, a rare Justice Clarence Thomas-authored brief, stated that the company Myriad Genetics is not within its rights to patent the cancer-linked genes BRCA1 and BRCA2, which both have been found to occur in women who are hereditarily more likely to develop breast, ovarian and other cancers. Myriad developed a test to detect the genes and patented the test.

The BRCA1 and BRCA2 test is the one taken by actress Angelina Jolie, who recently went public with her decision to have a double mastectomy after testing positive for the cancer genes. Jolie said she based her decision on a positive test and the experiences she had watching her own mother struggle with breast cancer for a decade before her death in 2007.

The Court ruled that companies cannot patent naturally occurring DNA,  and even though BRCA1 and BRCA2 are mutations, they still naturally occur. The ruling, in effect, denies Myriad a monopoly on the detection test, meaning that other companies can now create tests to offer a second opinion. It also means that Myriad can no longer keep the cost of the test artificially inflated at $3,000