High cost of intellectual property

IN 2013, actress Angelina Jolie had a preventive double mastectomy after tests confirmed she had a BRCA1 gene mutation, which greatly increased her risk of developing breast and ovarian cancer. She noted that the tests were out of reach for most women due to its high cost (US$3,000) charged by Myriad Genetics, which holds multiple patents for the BRCA gene sequence.

The initial breakthrough linking breast cancer to a gene identified its location but not the sequence. It came from collaboration by scientists mostly funded by government grants via the International Breast Cancer Linkage Consortium.