Such policies will compromise or distort 'public goods' in favour of corporate interests. If a company does not apply for patent protection in Ethiopia, Ethiopians have every right to avail themselves of the technology. If public science fails to disseminate technologies that could be beneficial to Third World countries merely because they would offend patent-holders in other countries, they are siding with the multinationals against the poor.
Public science has to decide who they are serving.
They are caught between a rock and a hard place. If they ignore corporate patents they could face reprisals not only from the companies but also from the Northern governments who fund international science. Although 'In Search of Higher Ground' emphasizes the perils of patenting and the failures of public science to meet the policy challenge, it also offers 28 specific steps that institutes could take to defend their interests. Among the 28 are several that would modify current patent regimes to safeguard public goods. For scientists, a protest letter in Nature constitutes a primal scream.