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THE PATENTING QUESTION.
551
THE
patent might easily have been abused. As a general rule, however judiciously money derived from the sale of patent remedies is expended, the exclusion of free competirion in manufacture and the payment of royalties may keep up prices, and so prevent the full
LANCET.
a new remedy or a diagnostic test from the A further largest possible public. reaching of firm to abuse when the business occurs possibility which a new product is entrusted by the patentee is unable or un willing to provide a potent preparation on a commercial scale, while other firms are not allowed to attempt to do so. We called attention more than a year ago to the double confirmation of the work of E. HERRMANN and S. FRÄNKEL (1915), who prepared an active extract of the ovarian hormone by a method patented by them on Feb. 13th, 1918 (E.P. 113, 311). We still await the large scale production of a standardised active extract of this hormone. None of the commercial material which has reached this country appears to fulfil the biological test of producing ocstrus when injected subcutaneously into a female rat. As a pleasant contrast, manufacturers were left free to produce for commercial purposes a parathyroid extract prepared by CoLLip’s method, and we have already been able to publish accounts of the valuable clinical results obtained by its use. So long as protection by patent was confined to what are known as patent medicines, the matter was not overwhelmingly serious. There were objections to the system which invests the pill and the cough mixture with magic qualities in excess of their merits, but the general improvement in public knowledge has mitigated these evils ; medical men may think hardly of the situation, but the Exchequer will remember that a not inconsiderable revenue is derived from the stamp duties on proprietary medicines. Selfishness is not a vice of which its worst critics have hitherto been able to accuse the medical profession or the research worker in this country. Medical ethics reject monopoly. What is to be the effect upon research if the Patent Acts are invoked to protect each stage in scientific progress ? Rewards will be claimed for the man who gives some finishing touch, perhaps almost accidentally, to work done by men in many countries and for many years without reward. Indeed, if we glance again at the naval and military parallel, it is notorious that the special machinery for remunerating inventors in respect of devices used in the Great War has been open to much criticism, both on general principles and in the matter of particular awards. Medical research, conducted in the public interest, is as incompatible with secrecy and shut doors as with legal injunctions or heavy royalties. Present tendencies are disquieting and indeed alarming. Public opinion needs to be aroused and action taken. The medical profession will unhesitatingly repudiate the commercial exploitation of scientific discoveries which relieve pain and cure or prevent disease. In this condemnation it should be sure of the support of public opinion ; having successfully combated the evils of monopolies three hundred years ago, this country is not likely to tolerate them to-day in the sphere of medical treatment.
beneiit of LONDON:SATURDAY, MARCH 12, 1927.
THE PATENTING QUESTION. THE application made by G. F. and G. H. DICK fora patent in respect of what are labelled improve"
ments in
scarlet fever toxin and antitoxin and methods for producing same will cause considerable apprehension. A specification has been deposited at the Patent Office in respect to the discovery of a process of isolating hæmolytic streptococci specific to scarlet fever, growing them in a suitable medium and obtaining therefrom toxin and antitoxin specific to scarlet fever. Patents in this respect, it appears, are being obtained both in England and America. The patent specification includes the processes for identifying the antitoxin, the method of using the human skin for tests, and other connected processes. If a system of monopoly is allowed to pervade medical science, what is to be the end of it ? What is there to prevent the monopolist from stifling research, restricting the manufacture of vital remedies, or from raising prices so high that the poor patient will have no prospect of competing for them against the rich ’? Our Patents and Designs Acts contain provisions by which Government departments can intervene to operate processes in special cases. In naval and matters are not allowed to prevent military monopolies the nation from equipping itself with the necessary means of self-protection. Is it not time to apply similar principles to the fight against disease’? Problems of great importance are raised by this growing tendency to use the methods of commercialism in the production and protection of medical remedies. Thirty years ago, when E. von BEIIRING patented his diphtheria antitoxin, professional opinion in Germany and elsewhere was naturally hostile to the piling up of personal fortunes from biological patents ; the patent was everywhere ignored, and no effective -protest was made by the patentee. Since then the, attempt to use the machinery of patent laws for the benefit of the discoverer of a drug or probeen chiefly concerned with new gress have synthetic drugs, of which salvarsan is an example. Of recent years, however, another invasion of commercialism into the marketing of biological products has been manifest. Insulin was patented by the University of Toronto presumably in order that the proceeds might be used to further research. At any rate, no selfish use has been made of the monopoly. This result was doubtless the outcome of the judicious intervention of the Medical Research Council, whose immediate action prevented the country from being flooded by imitation products, and secured a safe and cheap supply as quickly as possible in this country. In other hands such a ’’
.
’
.
,
’
THE
patent might easily have been abused. As a general rule, however judiciously money derived from the sale of patent remedies is expended, the exclusion of free competirion in manufacture and the payment of royalties may keep up prices, and so prevent the full
LANCET.
a new remedy or a diagnostic test from the A further largest possible public. reaching of firm to abuse when the business occurs possibility which a new product is entrusted by the patentee is unable or un willing to provide a potent preparation on a commercial scale, while other firms are not allowed to attempt to do so. We called attention more than a year ago to the double confirmation of the work of E. HERRMANN and S. FRÄNKEL (1915), who prepared an active extract of the ovarian hormone by a method patented by them on Feb. 13th, 1918 (E.P. 113, 311). We still await the large scale production of a standardised active extract of this hormone. None of the commercial material which has reached this country appears to fulfil the biological test of producing ocstrus when injected subcutaneously into a female rat. As a pleasant contrast, manufacturers were left free to produce for commercial purposes a parathyroid extract prepared by CoLLip’s method, and we have already been able to publish accounts of the valuable clinical results obtained by its use. So long as protection by patent was confined to what are known as patent medicines, the matter was not overwhelmingly serious. There were objections to the system which invests the pill and the cough mixture with magic qualities in excess of their merits, but the general improvement in public knowledge has mitigated these evils ; medical men may think hardly of the situation, but the Exchequer will remember that a not inconsiderable revenue is derived from the stamp duties on proprietary medicines. Selfishness is not a vice of which its worst critics have hitherto been able to accuse the medical profession or the research worker in this country. Medical ethics reject monopoly. What is to be the effect upon research if the Patent Acts are invoked to protect each stage in scientific progress ? Rewards will be claimed for the man who gives some finishing touch, perhaps almost accidentally, to work done by men in many countries and for many years without reward. Indeed, if we glance again at the naval and military parallel, it is notorious that the special machinery for remunerating inventors in respect of devices used in the Great War has been open to much criticism, both on general principles and in the matter of particular awards. Medical research, conducted in the public interest, is as incompatible with secrecy and shut doors as with legal injunctions or heavy royalties. Present tendencies are disquieting and indeed alarming. Public opinion needs to be aroused and action taken. The medical profession will unhesitatingly repudiate the commercial exploitation of scientific discoveries which relieve pain and cure or prevent disease. In this condemnation it should be sure of the support of public opinion ; having successfully combated the evils of monopolies three hundred years ago, this country is not likely to tolerate them to-day in the sphere of medical treatment.
beneiit of LONDON:SATURDAY, MARCH 12, 1927.
THE PATENTING QUESTION. THE application made by G. F. and G. H. DICK fora patent in respect of what are labelled improve"
ments in
scarlet fever toxin and antitoxin and methods for producing same will cause considerable apprehension. A specification has been deposited at the Patent Office in respect to the discovery of a process of isolating hæmolytic streptococci specific to scarlet fever, growing them in a suitable medium and obtaining therefrom toxin and antitoxin specific to scarlet fever. Patents in this respect, it appears, are being obtained both in England and America. The patent specification includes the processes for identifying the antitoxin, the method of using the human skin for tests, and other connected processes. If a system of monopoly is allowed to pervade medical science, what is to be the end of it ? What is there to prevent the monopolist from stifling research, restricting the manufacture of vital remedies, or from raising prices so high that the poor patient will have no prospect of competing for them against the rich ’? Our Patents and Designs Acts contain provisions by which Government departments can intervene to operate processes in special cases. In naval and matters are not allowed to prevent military monopolies the nation from equipping itself with the necessary means of self-protection. Is it not time to apply similar principles to the fight against disease’? Problems of great importance are raised by this growing tendency to use the methods of commercialism in the production and protection of medical remedies. Thirty years ago, when E. von BEIIRING patented his diphtheria antitoxin, professional opinion in Germany and elsewhere was naturally hostile to the piling up of personal fortunes from biological patents ; the patent was everywhere ignored, and no effective -protest was made by the patentee. Since then the, attempt to use the machinery of patent laws for the benefit of the discoverer of a drug or probeen chiefly concerned with new gress have synthetic drugs, of which salvarsan is an example. Of recent years, however, another invasion of commercialism into the marketing of biological products has been manifest. Insulin was patented by the University of Toronto presumably in order that the proceeds might be used to further research. At any rate, no selfish use has been made of the monopoly. This result was doubtless the outcome of the judicious intervention of the Medical Research Council, whose immediate action prevented the country from being flooded by imitation products, and secured a safe and cheap supply as quickly as possible in this country. In other hands such a ’’
.
’
.
,
’