Bill could stifle innovation

In the heat of a presidential election, important issues continually get drowned out in the media by the excitement and drama of the campaigns.

As someone who has worked in the medical field for nearly my entire career, I can say there are many issues important to our day-to-day care for patients beyond just Obamacare and the other national hot-button issues.

The protections provided by our patent system have protected the intellectual property of those in the medical field for decades. And those same protections have led to more and more advances within the field. There’s been talk for months now about trying to alter the patent system by essentially rewriting the entire law — a step that I believe will lead to a horrible weakening of our patent protections.

Is the system perfect? Of course not, but we don’t need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The U.S. Senate has a bill pending in committee right now (SB 1137) that would dramatically alter the patent system, which will result in less protection for inventors and therefore less innovation.

In a field such as medicine, we can’t afford to take our foot off the gas for even a second when it comes to exploring more effective and efficient ways to care for our patients. I would urge both Sens. Casey and Toomey to vote no on this legislation should it come before the full Senate for a vote.

This story was originally published February 17, 2016 at 12:06 AM with the headline "Bill could stifle innovation."