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Argument: Gene patents do not offer monopoly power to inventors

Issue Report: Gene patents

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Geoffrey M. Karny. “In Defense of Gene Patenting.” Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News. April 1, 2007: “It is also not a monopoly, even though the right extends to a class of things, because a monopoly is defined by market power. As many a disappointed inventor well knows, having a patent is no guarantee of commercial success. Quite simply, a patent is granted to provide the inventor and/or his company or investors the incentive to undertake the costly and risky process of further development and commercialization. They will do so because they can charge enough for the product to recover their investment. […] In return, the public gets the invention, but not for free. What it gets for free is the new technical knowledge to build on because the patent must disclose how to make and how to use the invention in terms that a person skilled in that technology can understand. And, after the patent expires, the public even gets the invention for free.”