Aggregated News

An Ottawa hospital is challenging the legality of gene patents that hamper the ability of doctors to freely screen for potentially deadly genetic diseases without fear of being sued for patent violations.

On Monday, the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) started a legal process in Federal Court that could decide if human genes can be patented in Canada.

"The core position really is that no one should be able to patent human DNA," said Alex Munter, president and CEO of the Ottawa-based CHEO. "It would be like patenting water or air."

"It’s about whether Canadian hospitals can provide genetic testing to Canadian patients and really give them the top quality of care," said Richard Gold, a lawyer and intellectual property expert at McGill University in Montreal, who is advising the hospital pro bono.

Currently, some genetic tests can’t be done in Canada because U.S. companies hold patents on the tests and the genes and have threatened legal action if the patents are violated by doing the tests in Canada, rather than the U.S.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year...