Patent Opposition
AMTC has provided legal assistance to various patients' rights groups in filing pre- and post-grant patent oppositions again12st key drugs. Already, we've achieved some remarkable victories.
Patent Oppositions
AMTC has provided legal assistance to various patients' rights groups in filing pre- and post-grant patent oppositions again12st key drugs. Already, we've achieved some remarkable victories. In January 2006, the Patent Examiner in Chennai sided with the Cancer Patients Aid Association in denying Novartis a patent for Gleevec, a treatment for leukemia. This allowed the Indian generic companies to continue manufacturing their versions, priced at a cost 8-12 times lower than what Novartis was charging. In August of 2006, GlaxoSmithKline announced that it would withdraw its patent application for Combivir ( Indian speck Combivir, Combivir Opposition) [Click here to download attachment], a critical fixed dose combination drug therapy for AIDS, in response to a patent opposition filed by the Indian Network for People Living with HIV/AIDS and the Manipur Network of Positive People.
We have filed or are involved in several other pending oppositions, including -
- Atazanavir [Click here to download attachment]
- Valganciclovir [Click to download attachments( Valganciclovir Abstract,
Valganciclovir Opposition)] - Efavirenz [Click to download attachments( Efavirenz Abstract, Efavirenz Opposition)]
- Tenofovir and
- Amprenavir [Click to download attachments( Amprenavir Abstract, Amprenavir Opposition)]
- Pegasys
and more will be filed in the coming days. However, with over 11,000 patent applications relating to pharmaceutical products pending before the Indian Patent Office, it is impossible for us to oppose the patenting of every essential medicine. By making our oppositions publicly available, it is our hope that other civil society groups will also take on the fight, so that essential medicines relating to cancer, diabetes, mental illness, and other disease do not come under a patent monopoly.