Last week, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom declared that the COVID-19 outbreak "can be characterized as a pandemic," cautioning that the WHO has "rung the alarm bell loud and clear."  At the time of the announcement, the WHO noted that there were 118,000 cases reported globally in 114 countries.  In its latest situation report, the WHO indicates that as of March 19, there have been 209,839 cases in 167 countries.  The Director-General also stated that "[t]his is not just a public health crisis, it is a crisis that will touch every sector – so every sector and every individual must be involved in the fight."  The WHO's declaration last week – and global developments since then – raise the question of how the pandemic is affecting the patent community.

All week, we have been reporting on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, World Intellectual Property Organization, European Patent Office, IP Australia, Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand (IPONZ), Brazilian Patent and Trademark Office (INPI), Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO), and Mexican Institute of Industrial Property (IMPI), and U.S. Federal courts, including, in particular, the Supreme Court and Federal Circuit.  Today we present recent developments in the USPTO and Dominican Republic in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a USPTO Alert e-mail distributed earlier today, the USPTO announced that it considered the effects of COVID-19 to be an "extraordinary situation" within the meaning of 37 C.F.R. § 1.183 for affected patent and trademark applicants, patentees, reexamination parties, and trademark owners.  AS a result, the USPTO was waiving the requirements under 37 C.F.R. § 1.4(e)(1) and (2) for an original handwritten signature for certain correspondence with the Office of Enrollment and Discipline and certain payments by credit card.  In its Alert, the Office noted that the requirements of § 1.4(e)(1) and (2) are the only USPTO requirements for original handwritten, ink signatures, and that the Office has no other requirements for original handwritten, ink signatures.

Dominican patent law firm Troncoso y Caceres notified the patent community regarding developments in the Dominican Republic.  The Judicial Power of the Dominican Republic has communicated through its Council that in compliance with the state of national emergency requested by the President, court hearings throughout the country are suspended until April 13, and has provided that courts will only be in operation for document reception service with the minimum necessary personnel.  The National Office of Intellectual Property (ONAPI) has suspended all legal terms granted to individuals for the registration of distinctive signs until March 31, 2020, and with the exception of patent, utility model, and industrial design applications for registration, for which face to face service remains, is otherwise accepting only online service.

Patent Docs will continue to monitor and report on patent-related developments related to the COVID-19 pandemic.  In addition, we encourage our readers to let us know about developments related to the COVID-19 pandemic at other patent offices.