USA Today A12, 5/19/95
Today's debate: GENETICS VS. RELIGION
Bad news for patients
helped by gene therapy
OUR VIEW A new coalition
wants to halt pat-
ents vital to lifesaving research.
Why handicap disease fighters?
There's bad news today for Joan Sa-
muelson and others like her praying for ge-
etic research to develop cures for their de-
bilitating diseases or to ease their suffering.
An ecumenical coalition of religious
leaders representing more than 80 faiths
and denominations joined biotechnology
adversary Jeremy Rifkin Thursday to cam-
paign against government patenting of hu-
man and animal genes, cells and organs.
If successful, these spiritual leaders could
doom lifesaving genetic research -- and
people like Samuelson, 45, of Santa Rosa,
Calif. "Every day I lose more brain cells
and develop more Parkinson's symp-
toms," she says. "Someday I will be frozen
in my body, able to think and feel but un-
able to move or speak. We cannot allow
this campaign to stall or stop research on a
cure or breakthrough therapy."
But that's exactly what biotech industry
representatives say would happen if the re-
ligious leaders prevail in their crusade.
Patents are the lifeblood of research.
They make it possible for biopharmaceuti-
cal companies to attract investments to pay
for the years of research and testing that
can cost $300 million for a single drug. The
patent provides an opportunity to make a
profit before competitors can produce the
same medicine.
Patent protection was the basis for nearly
all the 29 biotechnology drugs approved so
far by the Food and Drug Administration.
Among them: An anti-clot drug that has
saved more than 500,000 heart-attack vic-
tims since 1981. A blood-clotting drug im-
portant to hemophiliacs. A drug that helps
children with cystic fibrosis breathe more
easily.
Thanks to patent protections, today
there are drugs to help people with multiple
sclerosis, a vaccine for hepatitis B, diagnos-
tic tests that help protect the blood supply
from AIDS, detect colon, breast and pros-
tate cancers and help identify diseases in
the early stages while they can be treated.
And strides are being made in hormone
therapy for women and against sickle-cell
anemia, HIV infection and Alzheimer's.
All this even though the government has
awarded patents for human gene develop-
ments only since 1980. Only nine animal
patents have been granted.
It would be tragic to pull the plug on
these and potential medical breakthroughs.
The religious leaders obviously are sincere
in their spiritual beliefs. But government
policy should not be based on theology.
And the fears most often voiced by Rifkin
and other genetics critics -- that genetic re-
search will foster nightmarish eugenics ex-
periments or environmental catastrophe
-- are exaggerated at best.
Genetic research is more rigorously regu-
lated in the United States than in any other
country. Regulatory agencies involved in-
clude the FDA, National Institutes of
Health, Agriculture, Patent Office and the
Environmental Protection Agency.
Furthermore, many arguments against
gene patenting are based on fallacies.
It's not true, for instance, that genes are
patented. Only the use of genetic material
in a specific way for a specific purpose is
protected.
It's also not true that patents let anyone
own life. They protect the work of appli-
cants from being copied for 17 years.
And it's not fair to accuse genetic re-
searchers of playing God. They are saving
lives, relieving suffering and preventing
diseases -- which also happen to be basic
tenets of nearly every faith.
Perhaps one day the dangers of gene
therapy may outweigh the benefits. But
that day is not yet close. Certainly not close
enough to justify handing thousands of des-
perate sufferers like Joan Samuelson a sen-
tence of painful, lingering death.
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Let's stop paying God
OPPOSING VIEW Don't turn
over 'blue-
prints of God's creation' to scien-
tists, businesses to make a buck.
By Jeremy Rifkin
This week the religious leaders of more
than 80 faiths and denominations an-
nounced their opposition to the patenting
of genetically engineered animals and hu-
an genes, cells, organs and embryos.
The Joint Appeal Against Human and
Animal Patenting includes the titular heads
of virtually all of the Protestant denomina-
tions, more than 100 Catholic bishops, and
Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist and Hindu reli-
gious leaders. It is the broadest religious co-
alition ever assembled on a science, tech-
nology and commerce issue.
America's religious leaders are united in
their opposition to what they regard as a
dangerous new federal government policy.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has
ruled that the blueprints of life - the
world's gene pool -- are patentable and can
be treated as human inventions. Under the
bizarre new government policy, genetically
engineered animals and human genes,
cells, organs and embryos can be owned by
individual scientists and companies. In the
brave new world of the U.S. Patent office,
life has been redefined as a "manufacture
or composition of matter." If a researcher
implants a foreign gene into an animal's ge-
netic code -- for example, a human growth
hormone into a pig -- the genetically
engineered animal is considered a human
invention, like a computer, television or
car. Similarly, if a scientist isolates and
identifies the function of a human gene or
cell-line, it becomes his exclusive property.
By reducing life to the status of "human
inventions," the Patent Office has, in effect,
challenged the age-old belief that life on
Earth is God's creation. The consequences
of this new government policy are enor-
mous and far-reaching, affecting the very
meaning of life in the coming centuries.
Parents across the USA ought to ask
themselves whether their children will be
better or worse off growing up in a world
where they come to think of all of life, in-
cluding the genetic building blocks of hu-
man life, as mere inventions. By turning
life into patented inventions, the govern-
ment drains life of its intrinsic nature and
sacred value. Inventions are merely instru-
mental and driven by the logic of engineer-
ing values -- including efficiency, utility,
profitability and quantifiability. There is
no place in the world of machines for love,
empathy, stewardship, reverence and awe.
The biotechnology industry argues that
patents on life are essential to protect their
investments and foster needed research
into curing diseases, creating new drugs
and improving agriculture.
Nonsense. There are thousands of suc-
cessful products on the market today, in-
cluding drugs, medical procedures and
farm products which are not "protected"
by patents. A patent is simply the guarantee
of an exclusive government monopoly to
an individual or company to market an
"invention" for a given number of years
without having to fear competition by oth-
er companies. While the biotech compa-
nies might consider it heresy, the fact is that
some things in life are more important than
"monopolizing" profits. Life is more than a
commodity. The blueprints of God's cre-
ation should not be handed over to scien-
tists and corporations just to make a fast
buck in the marketplace.
The question of whether life itself is to be
regarded as a human invention or God's
creation is one of the seminal issues of the
coming age. If scientists and biotech com-
panies are allowed to patent all of life, it
could mean the final triumph of the values
of the marketplace over the values of faith.
Jeremy Rifkin is president of the Foundation
on Economic Trends, Washington, D.C.
