Healthy Skepticism Library item: 17731

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Electronic Source

Silverman E
Appeals Court Upholds Pay-For-Delay Deals
Pharmalot 2010 Apr 30
http://www.pharmalot.com/2010/04/appeals-court-upholds-pay-for-delay-deals/

Full text:

In a blow to the Federal Trade Commission, the US Second Circuirt Court of Appeals has upheld the legality of so-called pay-for-delay deals that thwart the introduction of generic rivals. But at the same time, the court suggested the issue needed further review (see the ruling).
The ruling was made after reviewing a deal in which Bayer paid Barr Pharmaceuticals, which is now owed by Teva Pharmaceuticals, to drop its patent challenge to the Cipro antibiotic. Barr challenged the Cipro patent in October 1991 and struck a deal with Bayer in January 1997, about two weeks before the case was set to go to trial.
The ruling is yet another setback for the Federal Trade Commission, which has been pushing aggressively to end pay-to-delay deals (look here). Two months ago, a federal judge dismissed an antitrust lawsuit filed by the FTC against Abbott Labs’s Solvay unit for allegedly conspiring with several generic drug makers to delay competition for a testosterone-replacement med (see here). And the White House included what became a scuttled proposal to make these deals illegal as part of its health care reform package.
However, the three-judge panel, in an unusual move, invited entities purchase drugs and had challenged the settlement to ask that the case be reviewed by the full circuit, citing the “exceptional importance” of the antitrust implications.