Methods of medical treatment of the human body are patentable inventions under Australian law and are not excluded as 'generally inconvenient' within the proviso to s 6 of the Statute of Monopolies. The logical impossibility of distinguishing between patentable pharmaceutical products and unpatentable methods of treatment, combined with Parliament's failure to exclude such methods when enacting the Patents Act 1990, confirms patentability. A claim for a particular dosage and duration of administration of a known anti-cancer drug whose properties are well known does not meet the threshold inventiveness requirement where the dosage and duration were arrived at by routine testing. Finkelstein J's analysis of ratio decidendi, if adopted, would expand the scope of binding precedent to include rulings on points of law treated by the judge as a necessary step in reaching the ultimate conclusion, even where the ruling does not support the order ultimately made.
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