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American Morning

Stem Cell Patent Dispute

Aired August 21, 2001 - 09:43   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Embryonic stem cell research has dominated the headlines lately, and today, CNN's going to gives you a rare look inside a lab that has four of the 60 stem cell lines we've been hearing about. This laboratory is offering the lines up for free, and this offer carries a condition though.

Our medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen, is here with the very latest on that.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, Leon, if you remember when this whole thing started it was all about morality. Is an embryo really a person, what does God want us to do? Well, now the discussion is all about money, and who's going to get it and who's not going to get it.

CNN has learned that one company that has four stem cell lines want to offer them up for free. Now, that's important news because last week we heard from the University of Wisconsin, hey, we have the patent on how to make an embryonic stem cell line. So, if anyone's going to make any money, we want a cut of it.

But, this Australian company called BresaGen, which has a lab here in Georgia, has said that if they give away the stem cell lines for free, then there's no commercial transaction, so there's no patent infringement. Here is how one BresaGen official explained it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALLAN ROBINS, SR. V.P., BRESAGEN: BresaGen would like to give the cells away, because we think from a moral and ethical standpoint, the more widely disseminated the cells are to do the bona fide research and development, then the better off everybody will be; because, we want to find cures for degenerative diseases in a timely fashion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: Now, of course, there is a catch. If BresaGen gives one of their lines to someone who comes up with, let's say the cure to cancer, BresaGen does want a cut of that action, they do want some money from that.

Now, we talked to the University of Wisconsin, they're not so sure about this end run that BresaGen is planning. They say that eventually, they'll get a cut of the money too. HARRIS: OK, but let me ask you even a more question that's been occurring to me, I'm sure plenty of people out there as well. How is that anybody, the University of Wisconsin or someone else, can come up and say that they have a patent on stem cells? How can they own a stem cell that actually comes out of someone else's body?

COHEN: Right, the stem cell comes from an embryo, so it comes from someone's sperms and someone's egg.

HARRIS: You got it.

COHEN: What they have, what the University of Wisconsin has is actually a patent on the technique to make stem cells from an embryo. So they say that anyone who gets stem cells from an embryo is probably using their technique, because it's the only one around right now for humans. So they say that means that we would get a cut on it, because we have a patent on the technique.

HARRIS: OK. The technique and not the stem cell itself.

COHEN: Right.

HARRIS: Anyway, Elizabeth Cohen, you always print these things up. Thank you. That's why we pay you the big bucks, I guess. All right, we'll talk with you later on.

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