On 20th April 2023, we will hold the launch event for the ERC funded PatentsInHumans Project at Maynooth University.
Dr Fergus Ryan, Head of the School of Law and Criminology, will provide a welcome and introductory remarks. Following this, Professor Aisling McMahon will introduce the project which examines the bioethical implications posed by patents – and how they are used -over technologies related to the human body (e.g. isolated human genes, medicines, and elements of medical devices), including how such patents can impact how we treat, use and modify our human bodies.
Professor Susi Geiger (UCD) and Dr Christine Kelly (UCD) will then provide reflections on such issues based on insights from their respective fields. This will be followed by a keynote lecture delivered by Professor Jorge Contreras on “The Civil Rights Case Against Gene Patents in America”. Professor Contreras is the James T. Jensen Endowed Professor for Transactional Law and Director of the Program on Intellectual Property and Technology Law at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law, with a secondary appointment in the Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine. He is the author of the 2021 book, The Genome Defence: Inside the Epic Legal Battle to Determine who owns your DNA (NY:Hachette/Algonquin, 2021) and is currently serving as a visiting fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
For more information and to register for the event (for catering purposes) please see: PatentsInHumans Launch Event Registration
The event will be followed by a reception, kindly supported by the School of Law and Criminology, which all attendees are invited to attend.