NATURE|Vol 435|16 June 2005 BOOKS & ARTS

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We see the costs and benefits of our globalizedworld — at higher risk, but mobilizing fasterand more smartly than ever before. This wasthe first ‘digital’ response to a lethal global epidemic: there were many examples of newdigital tools, such as some excellent case-information and geographical contact-tracing systems devised in Hong Kong and a secureInternet-linked laboratory network mountedby the WHO.

Discovering and characterizing the causalvirus and developing diagnostic tools trans-formed the global battle against SARS, andwas done faster than for any previous infec-tion. The tension created by simultaneouscompetition and collaboration among scien-tists chasing the virus, and the balance neededbetween excessive caution and reckless haste,are well described. This makes the virus huntone of the most fascinating aspects of theSARS story. There were false leads and badluck with initial culture attempts, but eventualsuccess for several groups. Hong Kong Uni-versity came out just ahead in the internationalrace to identify the causative agent, and itsfindings were validated by others within a few hours. This satisfactory scientific outcomecontrasts with that experienced by the hapless

young Chinese scientists who seem to havediscovered the virus several weeks earlier but could not reveal their findings becausethey would have contradicted incorrect state-ments made by their superiors — yet anotherprice paid by China for its initial managementof SARS.

The role played by the WHO is also anexcellent story by itself. A small team based inGeneva, Manila, China and Vietnam collabo-rated to provide the global and regionalleadership needed, and the results were excel-lent. We find out how difficult the task was —involving political skill, judgement andcourage. It is clear that the WHO in 2003 hadjust the right people to meet the SARS chal-lenge. Unfortunately, we cannot be assuredthat such resolve or skill will appear next time,and this is one of the more sobering lessonsfrom SARS. If left chronically underfunded, asin the past, the WHO may not have the staffand vigilance needed next time a comparablechallenge arises.

I commend this book to those with an inter-est in emerging infections, SARS and China. ■

Adrian Sleigh is at the National Centre forEpidemiology and Population Health, AustralianNational University, Canberra 0200, Australia.

Nations Convention on Biological Diversity(CBD) of 1992 was intended to respond to this conflict and ensure the equitable sharingof benefits derived from the access to, and useof, genetic resources. But the convention hasso far had only limited success, and at theWorld Summit for Sustainable Developmentin Johannesburg in 2002, calls were made forthe negotiation of an international regime onaccess and benefit sharing (ABS).

The history of biodiversity collection, andthe transformation and commodification ofgenetic material, is the subject of Trading theGenome by Bronwyn Parry. Reviewing boththe technological and the regulatory history of the gene trade, Parry’s book provides insight into the complex problems facing the global community in regulating the access to, and the use of, genetic resources. With negotiationsfor the development of an international ABSregime due to begin in earnest in January 2006in Spain, this publication is particularly timely.

Focusing her research on a number of keyUS initiatives, including those involving theNational Cancer Institute and the US phar-maceutical industry, Parry reviews their collection, research and product-developmentpractices, and long-term objectives. She per-suasively argues that the end of large-scale bioprospecting is drawing close. Ever moresophisticated means of synthesizing and repli-cating collected material, as well as of miningboth living and dried specimens in ex situ

collections, will remove the need for much insitu bioprospecting. And combinatorial chem-istry will replace the need to find resources in the wild.

Refreshingly, Parry contests the frequentlyposited position that combinatorial chemistryis free of all benefit-sharing obligations, andnotes the need to close the legal loopholeregarding pre-CBD collections. One key con-clusion is the need to develop effective meansof tracing the many and extensive uses ofgenetic resources and derived informationalproducts. Unfortunately, her study does notrefer to the work of the CBD in this area, inparticular to the ongoing study of the practi-calities, feasibility and cost of certificates oforigin as a means of tracing the flow of geneticresources. I would also have liked to see morein-depth analysis of potential technologicalmeans of responding to the challenges ofresource transformation and the monitoring ofdirect and indirect uses of genetic information.

Parry comes to the conclusion that furtherefforts to secure regulatory control are mis-placed, suggesting instead that countriesshould seek alternative benefit-sharing mech-anisms. She also suggests the establishment ofan international trust for benefit sharing, anidea that is to some extent akin to the modelincluded in the recently adopted InternationalTreaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Foodand Agriculture of the United Nations Foodand Agriculture Organization. However, herfailure to expand on this area of research andplace it within the context of the ongoing ABS negotiation process weakens the value ofwhat could have been a more substantial andreasoned proposal.

Overall, however, the book is a welcomeaddition to the literature and will be a valuableresource for researchers, decision-makers andmembers of the public who are interested in understanding what happens to geneticresources after they have been collected. It willprovide little in the way of policy insight forveterans of the bioprospecting debate, but itsorganized presentation of the transformationof the bioprospecting trade and of the devel-opment of bioinformatics is well worth theread. However, its conclusions need to be considered in the light of recent developments.Among these are efforts by developed coun-tries to adopt so-called ‘user measures’ to reg-ulate the use of imported genes; debates in theCBD, the World Intellectual Property Organi-zation and the World Trade Organization onproposals to include obligations to disclose theorigin of genetic resources in patent appli-cations; and work examining the feasibility, practicality and cost of mechanisms, such ascertificates of origin to track flows of geneticresources, as described in a United NationsUniversity report (www.ias.unu.edu/binaries/UNUIAS_UserMeasures_2ndEd.pdf). ■

Brendan Tobin is at the Institute of AdvancedStudies, United Nations University, Nishi-ku,Yokohama 220-0012, Japan.

The power of collecting Trading the Genome by Bronwyn ParryColumbia University Press: 2004. 352 pp.$39.50, £25.50

Brendan TobinThe collection, control and commodificationof biological resources, historically seen as thecommon heritage of humanity, have long had arole in the efforts of nations to build and main-tain their economic and political power. Oneof the earliest and most ambitious projects ofthis sort was the proposal made to Britain’sKing George III to transplant breadfruit fromTahiti to serve as a source of food for slaves inthe West Indies. A mutiny on the ship chosento transport the plants — the Bounty —quickly brought to an end the first major state-supported attempt by the scientific commu-nity to relocate economic plants.

More recently, advances in biotechnologyand information technology have transformedthe processes involved in the collection, trans-port and storage of biological resources andthe information they contain. A new surge in collection in the 1980s was fuelled byimprovements in the ability to isolate com-pounds from plants and animals, coupled with regulatory mechanisms enabling patentsto be obtained over them. This time, however,developing countries, the primary source ofbiological resources, strongly resisted whatsome saw as biocolonialism. The United

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