Some Legal Issues Regarding the Patenting of Human Genetic Materials

This article examines issues of ethics, science and law in the context of a recent High Court decision involving an application by Yvonne D’Arcy to revoke patents granted to Myriad Genetics Inc for various genetic sequences found in the BRCA1 gene once isolated (which, when certain mutations were present, had been found to be linked to the occurrence of breast and ovarian cancer). This article provides a brief discussion on the history of patent law and an extensive discussion of the requirements under s 18(1) of the Patents Act 1990 (Cth) for the granting of a patent involving the use of human genetic material.