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CHAPTER 093

At the fall meeting of the Organization of University Technology Transfer officers (OUTT), a group dedicated to licensing the work of university scientists, philanthropist Jack B. Watson gave the stirring keynote address. He struck his familiar themes: the spectacular growth of biotechnology, the importance of gene patents, keeping Bayh-Dole in place, and the necessity of preserving the status quo for business prosperity and university wealth. “The health and wealth of our universities depends on strong biotech partners. This is the key to knowledge, and the key to the future!”

He told them what they wanted to hear, and left the stage to the usual thunderous applause. Only a few noticed that he walked with a slight limp and that his right arm did not swing as freely as the left.

Backstage, he took the arm of a beautiful woman. “Where the hell is Dr. Robbins?”

“He’s waiting for you in his clinic,” she said.

Watson swore, then leaned on the woman as he walked outside to the waiting limousine. The night was cold, with a faint mist. “Fucking doctors,” he said. “I’m not doing any more damn tests.”

“Dr. Robbins didn’t mention anything about tests.”

The driver opened the door. Watson climbed in awkwardly, his leg dragging. The woman helped him in. He slumped in the back, wincing. The woman got in on the other side. “Is the pain bad?”

“It’s worse at night.”

“Do you want a pill?”

“I already took one.” He inhaled deeply. “Does Robbins know what the hell this is?”

“I think so.”

“Did he tell you?”

“No.”

“You’re lying.”

“He didn’t tell me, Jack.”

“Christ.”

The limousine sped through the night. Watson stared out the window, breathing hard.

The hospital clinic was deserted at this hour. Fred Robbins, thirty-five and handsome as a movie star, was waiting for Watson with two younger physicians, in a large examining room. Robbins had set up light boxes with X-ray, electrophoresis and MRI results.

Watson dropped heavily into a chair. He waved to the younger men. “You can go.”

“But Jack-”

“Tell me alone,” Watson said to Robbins. “Nineteen fucking doctors have examined me in the last two months. I’ve done so many MRIs and CAT scans I glow in the dark. You tell me.” He waved to the woman. “You wait outside, too.”

They all left. Watson was alone with Robbins.

“They say you’re the smartest diagnostician in America, Fred. So tell me.”

“Well,” Robbins said, “it’s as much a biochemical process as anything. That’s why I wanted-”

“Three months ago,” Watson said, “I had a pain in my leg. A week later the leg was dragging. My shoe was worn on the edge. Pretty soon I had trouble walking up stairs. Now I have weakness in my right arm. Can’t squeeze toothpaste with my hand. It’s getting hard to breathe. In three months! So tell me.”

“It’s called Vogelman’s paresis,” Robbins said. “It’s not common, but not rare. A few thousand cases every year, maybe fifty thousand worldwide. First described in the 1890s, by a French-”

“Can you treat it?”

“At this point,” Robbins said, “there are no satisfactory treatments.”

“Are there any treatments?”

“Palliative and supportive measures, massage and B vitamins-”

“But no treatments.”

“Not really, Jack, no.”

“What causes it?”

“That we know. Five years ago, Enders’s team at Scripps isolated a gene,BRD7A, that codes for a protein that repairs myelin around nerve cells. They’ve demonstrated that a point mutation in the gene produces Vogelman’s paresis in animals.”

“Well, hell,” Watson said, “you’re telling me I’ve got a genetic deficiency disease like any other.”

“Yes, but-”

“How long ago did they find the gene? Five years? Then it’s a natural for gene replacement, start the coded protein being made inside the body…”

“Replacement therapy is risky, of course.”

“Do I give a damn? Look at me, Fred. How much time do I have?”

“The time course is variable, but…”

“Spit it out.”

“Maybe four months.”

“Jesus.” Watson sucked in his breath. He ran his hand over his forehead, took another breath. “Okay, so that’s my situation. Let’s do the therapy. Five years later, they must have a protocol.”

“They don’t,” Robbins said.

“Somebody must.”

“They don’t. Scripps patented the gene and licensed it to Beinart Baghoff, the Swiss pharma giant. It was part of a package deal with Scripps, about twenty different collaborations.BRD7A wasn’t regarded as particularly important.”

“What’re you saying?”

“Beinart put a high license fee on the gene.”

“Why? It’s an orphan disease, it makes no sense to-”

Robbins shrugged. “They’re a big company. Who knows why they do things. Their licensing division sets fees for eight hundred genes that they control. There’s forty people in that division. It’s a bur eaucracy. Anyway, they set the license high-”

“Christ.”

“And no laboratory, anywhere in the world, has worked on the disease in the last five years.”

“Christ.”

“Too expensive, Jack.”

“Then I’ll buy the damn gene.”

“Can’t. I already checked. It’s not for sale.”

“Everything’s for sale.”

“Any sale by Beinart has to be approved by Scripps, and the Scripps office of tech transfer won’t consider-”

“Never mind, I’ll license it myself.”

“You can do that. Yes.”

“And I’ll set up the gene transfer myself. We’ll get a team in this hospital to do it.”

“I really wish we could, Jack. But gene transfer’s extremely risky, and no lab will take the chance these days. Nobody’s gone to jail yet over a failed gene transfer, but there have been a lot of patient deaths, and-”

“Fred. Look at me.”

“You can get it done in Shanghai.”

“No, no. Here.”

Fred Robbins bit his lip. “Jack, you have to face reality. There’s less than a one percent success rate. I mean, if we had done five years of work, we would have the results of animal tests, vector tests, immunosuppressive protocols, all kinds of steps to increase your chance of success. But just shooting from the hip-”

“That’s all I have time for. Shooting from the hip.”

Fred Robbins was shaking his head.

“A hundred million dollars,” Watson said. “For whatever lab does it. Take over a private clinic out in Arcadia. Just me, nobody knows. Do the procedure there. It works or it doesn’t.”

Fred Robbins shook his head sadly. “I’m sorry, Jack. I really am.”