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rrrrr · 3778 days ago · link · · parent · post: US Government's patent on "Human Ebola Virus Species and Compositions and Methods Thereof"
As someone who does not know the politics of this field, I find it surprising that you can patent a naturally occurring virus, rather than your inventions relating to the virus. I suppose it is intended to protect whoever stumps up the money to sequence the genome, but still it seems a bit repugnant. More like the politics of colonization than science: if I saw it first I can stop anyone else coming here. It seems to run counter to the principle that science contributes to, and thrives on access to, the store of human knowledge. I guess what we are dealing with is the blurred boundaries between science, technology and industry.