During the second and third readings on 3 December 2004, the lower house of the German parliament (Bundestag) passed a bill that will implement European Union Directive 98/44/EC on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions, with some changes regarding gene sequence patenting1,2. The implementation is expected to take place in February/March 2005 after the law has been signed by the federal president and published in the official journal (Bundesgesetzblatt), more than four and a half years past the original deadline of July 20003.
The ruling coalition (Social Democratic Party and the Green Party) was split on the adoption of the directive as the...
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