Moral exclusions in European biotechnology patent law
Abstract: Biotechnology patent law raises moral issues since it concerns living material and the European Biotech Directive therefore contains exclusions for inventions that are contrary to “ordre public” or morality under Article 6. The purpose of this paper is to discover the scope of the moral exclusion in the Human, Animal and Plant fields of biotechnology patent law and to discuss the problems regarding the specified moral exclusions found in Article 6(2) of the Biotech Directive. The analysis shows that the moral exclusion scopes differ between these fields and that there is a more narrow moral protection for plant inventions. The broadest protection is found concerning human related inventions. The analysis also shows that the human moral exclusion scope is quite uncertain since there are different interpretations regarding this field. The specified moral exclusions under Article 6(2) of the Biotech Directive create uncertainty regarding the moral exclusion. The fact that the biotechnology field is a fast developing area, with large potential for creating medical benefits for human beings, makes it inappropriate to include too specified moral exclusions in the European biotechnology patent law.
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