BREVETTABILITA’ DELLE CELLULE STAMINALI EMBRIONALI: LA RISPOSTA DELLA SCUOLA PERSONALISTA - Pubblicato il 1 luglio 2011 da http://www.blogscienzaevita.org

È stata pubblicata sulla rivista Nature (30 june 2011; 474:579) una lettera del Dr. David Albert Jones,  Direttore dell’Anscombe Bioethics Centre di Oxford, co-firmata da altri 25 studiosi europei e centri di bioetica di ispirazione personalista fra cui il Prof. Antonio G. Spagnolo, Direttore dell’Istituto di Bioetica dell’Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Roma, e la Prof.ssa Laura Palazzani, Ordinario di Filosofia del Diritto presso l’università LUMSA di Roma e Vicepresidente del Comitato Nazionale per la Bioetica. La lettera è stata pubblicata in risposta ad alcuni ricercatori e scienziati europei – tra questi la Prof.ssa Elena Cattaneo dell’Università di Milano – che avevano criticato la decisione della Corte di Giustizia Europea che ha ritenuto non accettabile la brevettabilità delle cellule staminali embrionali.

More at stake in stem-cell patents

Austin Smith and others argue in favour of patenting technologies derived from human embryonic stem cells (Nature 472, 418; 2011), a case still pending with the European Court of Justice.

But there is more at stake than European commercial interests. In 1998, agreement was reached in Europe under Directive 98/44 not to recognize patents involving the use of human embryos for commercial purposes (R. Hipp and P. Liese Nature 474, 36; 2011). The court must decide whether the use of these cells ‘necessitates the prior destruction of human embryos or their use as base material’, as the advocate general, Yves Bot, has argued (see go.nature.com/gsap8n). If so, such use would seem to fall beyond the scope of what is legally patentable. Smith et al. warn that “European discoveries could be translated into applications elsewhere, at a potential cost to the European citizen.” This begs the question of whether patents, which may also be held by non-European companies, may sometimes impede wider research cooperation (S. Rabin Nature Biotechnol. 23, 817–819; 2005). In any case there will often be some commercial risk whenever Europe defends a more rigorous ethical standard than is defended elsewhere. This risk is not itself an argument against upholding the standard prescribed by law. Without prejudice to the final judgment in this case, the resolution of patent law is and ought to be more than a question of European commercial interest.

 David Albert Jones* Anscombe Bioethics Centre, Oxford, UK.

director@bioethics.org.uk

*On behalf of 25 co-signatories (see go.nature.com/2bkno7).

Full list of co-signatories to a Correspondence published in Nature 474, 579 (2011); doi: 10.1038/474579d.

David Albert Jones Anscombe Bioethics Centre, Oxford, UK.

director@bioethics.org.uk

Emmanuel Agius University of Malta, Malta.

Rogelio Altisent Institute for Bioethics and Health Sciences, Zaragoza, Spain.

Mónica López Barahona Biosciences Studies Centre, Madrid, Spain.

Axel W. Bauer Heidelberg University, Germany.

Stéphane Bauzon State University Roma Tor Vergata, Italy.

William Binchy Trinity College, Dublin, Republic of Ireland.

Donna Dickenson University of London, UK.

Jozef Glasa Institute of Health Care Ethics, Slovak Medical University in Bratislava, Slovak Republic.

Jean Marie Gueullette Centre for Ethics, Catholic University of Lyon, France.

Christian Hillgruber University of Bonn, Germany.

Søren Holm University of Manchester, UK.

Geoffrey Hunt Centre For Bioethics and Emerging Technologies, St Mary’s University College, Twickenham, UK.

Nikolaus Knoepffler Friedrich Schiller University, Jena, Germany.

Natalia López-Moratalla Spanish Association of Bioethics and Medical Ethics, Spain.

Emilio Mordini Centre for Science, Society and Citizenship, Rome, Italy.

Calum MacKellar Scottish Council on Human Bioethics, Edinburgh, UK.

Laura Palazzani Lumsa University, Rome, Italy

Ingrid Schneider Centre for Biotechnology, Society and the Environment — Medicine/Neuronal Sciences (FSP BIOGUM), University of Hamburg, Germany.

Paul Schotsmans Catholic University Leuven, Belgium.

Jiri Simek University of South Bohemia, Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic.

Antonio Spagnolo Institute of Bioethics, School of Medicine ‘A. Gemelli’ Rome, Italy.

Sigrid Sterckx Bioethics Institute Ghent, Ghent University, Belgium.

Patrick Verspieren Centre Sèvres, Paris, France.

Günter Virt University of Vienna, Austria.