[Pharm-policy] China will introduce stricter patent rules to accelerate advances of genetic medical treatment, a patent official said recently

[love@cptech.org]

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200105/26/eng20010526_71088.html  
  
 Saturday, May 26, 2001, updated at 10:17(GMT+8) 
 Sci-Edu   

Patent Protection for China's Genetic Engineering

China will introduce stricter patent rules to accelerate advances of
genetic medical treatment, a patent official said recently. 

Ma Zhaoruo, an official with the State Intellectual Property Office,
said at a human genetic diagnosis and treatment symposium held in this
capital of central China's Hunan Province that although the study of
genetic engineering is at an initial stage, the clinical advances in
techniques have shown the tendency of becoming the most important means
in medical treatment. 

In the next five years, China will accelerate the clinical
experimentation of genetic therapy to industrialize the patented medical
results. 

China has dealt with over 190 patents related to genetic medical
treatment submitted from the United States, Japan and some European
countries. 

Ma said that most of the patent applications are related to therapeutic
methods rather than new genetic materials or genomes. 

China's genetic engineering industry set off in the late 1980s, two
decades later than some other countries. Insufficient financial support
has also limited its progress. 

China has given the genetic engineering priority to tackling key
technical problems in genetic treatment, and has gained quite a few
patents in the sector, according to sources at the symposium. 

So far, the country has laid a good foundation in the genetic treatment
of liver cancer and pre-senile dementia. The technology has been
implemented in clinic treatment.