London - A British woman has become the first person to attempt to patent herself, the National Patent Office said yesterday. "I can confirm that we have received an application with the title `myself' from Donna Rawlinson MacLean," Mr Brian Caswell of the patent office said.
The Guardian newspaper said Ms MacLean, a poet and casino waitress from Bristol, was angered at the patenting of gene sequences by businesses. "It has taken 30 years of hard labour for me to discover and invent myself, and now I wish to protect my invention from unauthorised exploitation, genetic or otherwise," Ms Maclean told the newspaper.