A ROW has erupted in Europe over a possible patent on a breast cancer test that might lead to some of the most vulnerable women being denied the test, while others get it for free.
The test is for a specific mutation in the BRCA2 gene that predisposes women to breast cancer and is relatively common in Ashkenazi Jews. Although a previous patent on this and other BRCA2 mutations was overturned in February 2004 by the European Patent Office, the company that owned it 鈥� Myriad Genetics of Salt Lake City, Utah 鈥� has re-applied for worldwide monopoly rights 鈥渇or diagnosing a predisposition to breast cancer in Ashkenazi-Jewish women鈥�. It is the first time race has become an issue in the already controversial field of gene patents.
Geneticists have objected because, while the test could be offered free of charge to most European women, doctors wanting to offer it to Ashkenazi Jews would need a licence from Myriad. They might choose not to offer the test to the group that needs it most, says the European Society for Human Genetics in its opposition to the patent.
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鈥淚f the patent is granted I could test free of charge for the mutation provided the woman doesn鈥檛 tell me she is an Ashkenazi Jew,鈥� says geneticist Gert Matthijs of the Catholic University of Leuven (KUL) in Belgium, who opposes the patent. The issue will be decided on 29 June at a special hearing at the European Patent Office in Munich.
New 杏吧原创 contacted Myriad for comment but had not received a response by the time of going to press.
