China has given regulatory approval to the first therapy that uses a virus to attack tumor cells but leaves healthy cells undamaged. The therapy was developed by Shanghai Sunway Biotech and is a copy of a treatment that had been developed and abandoned by US-based Onyx Pharmaceuticals. Sunway had developed the therapy from a paper published by Onyx. As Onyx did not have a patent, Sunway did not violate intellectual property laws. But Sunway later obtained worldwide licensing rights to the treatment and intends to file at some point for US approval. Chinese regulatory authorities are proving less stringent in their requirements for new therapies. They have already approved the world's first gene therapy.
- see this article from The New York Times for more