A week or so ago, the head of the US Patent and Trademark Office, Andrei Iancu, who has been an extreme patent maximalist over the years, insisted that there was simply no evidence that patents hold back COVID treatments.

Dorian Daley, who asked the agency director to address concerns that intellectual property relating to COVID-19 might "create a barrier to access that would be problematic."

"Where is the evidence of that?" Iancu countered, though he noted that the U.S. has "tools at its disposal" — such as the "march-in" rights under the Bayh-Dole Act, which allows the government to invoke rarely used powers to override patents — in the event that additional access is needed.

Of course, historically, the pharma industry flips out any time anyone mentions march-in rights, which is why the government basically never ever uses them.

But just to highlight how ridiculous Iancu's statements were, just days later, Pfizer, Regeneron, and BioNTech -- all working on COVID treatments (including the antibody cocktail that President Trump took from Regeneron) -- were all sued for patent infringement for their COVID treatments.

Allele Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals filed two lawsuits against the three drugmakers on Monday. The San Diego firm alleges that Pfizer and BioNTech, with its investigational COVID-19 vaccine BNT162, and Regeneron’s REGN-COV2, were developed using Allele’s mNeonGreen fluorescent protein without the company’s permission.

So, it certainly appears that patents are getting in the way of some COVID-19 treatments.
And then to make an even stronger point ... Moderna Inc. said it wouldn’t enforce its patents related to Covid-19 vaccines during the pandemic, in an effort to not deter other companies and researchers from making similar shots.

“While the pandemic continues, Moderna will not enforce our Covid-19 related patents against those making vaccines intended to combat the pandemic,” the company said in a statement on Thursday.

This is a welcome surprise, but it still underlines two key points: yes, absolutely patents can and will get in the way of important life-saving innovations, and the idea that these companies "need" patents to develop these drugs is clearly bogus.

Indeed, as KEI points out in a blog post about Moderna's statement, it's good to see the company admit that even after the pandemic is over, its patents may get in the way of important life-saving innovation, and pledges to make sure that it will be more open to licensing its patents after the pandemic ...

Hatewatch’s finding marks the fourth website linking the U.S.-based white nationalist members of The Right Stuff to Russia Insider. Like some of the other websites Hatewatch previously reported as having this connection, Lancaster Patriot focused on sensational, negative attention on antiracist protesters and hyped the subject of civil unrest. Lancaster Patriot stands out from the network of other Russia Insider-affiliated websites because it focuses acutely on a swing state considered to be of vital importance in deciding the outcome of the 2020 election. In addition to targeting antiracist protests, Lancaster Patriot also focused on the effort to undo local restrictions put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic, sometimes with a conspiratorial tone.

After Hatewatch discovered the connection between websites related to The Right Stuff and Russia Insider, Hatewatch found the connection between Lancaster Patriot and oc.binaria.ru. Hatewatch forwarded the finding to Megan Squire, a professor of computer science at Elon University. Squire confirmed that three websites, thelancasterpatriot.com, Lancaster-blog.com, and oc.binaria.ru, all used the same tag on Google Analytics, meaning “all three sites are very likely run by the same person,” Squire said. She also noted that all three sites include identical code for a different .ru address, which she described as a “known malware distribution site.”

“The most likely explanation for the large amount of shared code between the three sites is that binaria.ru serves as a staging site where the web site design is tested and refined before being rolled out onto the live ‘production’ sites, Lancaster-Blog and TheLancasterPatriot,” Squire told Hatewatch by email. “It is alarming that the Lancaster Patriot Facebook Page has apparently not been through even a minimal identity verification process, despite promoting a Russian-developed site that includes code from a known malware domain and running un-vetted political advertisements 42 days before an election.