Row as Maasai gene patented

• Pastoralists ability to drink lots of milk is at the centre of a scientific dispute

Maasai morans may not know it, but they are at the centre of a global scientific controversy over a patent application for their genetic capacity to drink lots of milk.

The row broke out a fortnight ago when South African researchers complained that the University of Maryland in the US had patented gene mutations collected from Kenya, Tanzania, Sudan and South Africa.

The application, filed in 2007 and published last year, records Prof Sarah Tishkoff – then with the University of Maryland – and Floyd Allan Reed as the inventors and sole applicants.

When contacted by the Nation, Dr Tishkoff said the application was not made for any commercial gains but to protect the invention from intellectual property prospectors.

In Kenya, the study was carried out in 26 sites, in the Rift Valley, Eastern, Central and Nyanza provinces. The Maasai, like the other pastoral communities in the study, were found to have a gene mutation that allows for higher milk tolerance.

Although almost everybody feeds on milk as a baby, after being weaned a gene that helps in digesting lactose, a sugar found in dairy products, switches off denying many adults the capacity to digest or tolerate milk.

The study in question has now identified the responsible gene mutation, more prevalent in pastoral communities such as the Maasai.

Using advanced biotechnology Prof Tishkoff, who has since moved to University of Pennsylvania, US, and Floyd Reed developed a process which could be exploited for industrial purposes. It is this process that is being patented.

The Kenyan researcher in the study group is Dr Sabah A. Omar of the Kenya Medical Research Institute.

“If not patented any commercial group can exploit it and no gains would go to the local communities,” she told the Nation in Nairobi on Saturday.

The study had been approved by Kemri’s ethical board.

While milk seems to be a universal food, a lot of people actually cannot tolerate it as it will resort to upset stomach and other unpleasant digestive side effects.

Theoretically the new discovery could lead to new medical diagnostic kits to identify those with milk taking disorders or perhaps develop enzymes that could remove milk intolerance.