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Who’S Afraid Of Section 1498? A Case For Government Patent Use In Pandemics And Other National Crises, Christopher J. Morten, Charles Duan
Who’S Afraid Of Section 1498? A Case For Government Patent Use In Pandemics And Other National Crises, Christopher J. Morten, Charles Duan
Faculty Scholarship
COVID-19 has created pressing and widespread needs for vaccines, medical treatments, PPE, and other medical technologies, needs that may conflict – indeed, have already begun to conflict – with the exclusive rights conferred by United States patents. The U.S. government has a legal mechanism to overcome this conflict: government use of patented technologies at the cost of government-paid compensation under 28 U.S.C. § 1498. But while many have recognized the theoretical possibility of government patent use under that statute, there is today a conventional wisdom that § 1498 is too exceptional, unpredictable, and dramatic for practical use, to the point …