[Pharm-policy] evergreening the cisplatin patent

[James Love]

This is yet another way to exploit breast cancer patients.  Cisplatlin
is sold on an exclusive basis by Bristol-Myers Squibb, which has been
making a bundle off this government funded invention for decades.  Jamie


http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/03/press3.htm


"Meanwhile, universities are devising increasingly creative -- and
controversial -- ways to raise their royalty earnings. Michigan State
University, for example, recently took the unusual step of applying for
a new, slightly altered patent on a widely prescribed cancer drug,
cisplatin, that was patented by
the university in 1979.

"Filing twice on the same invention is prohibited, but MSU's original
patent, which along with its analog,
carboplatin, generated $160 million in royalties, was about to expire.

"Thus the slight alteration. 

"The move may have been good for MSU's bottom line, but did it serve the
public interest? MSU's action
prevented four generic-drug manufacturers from marketing a cheaper
version of cisplatin, and these companies are now suing MSU - all of
which prompted Barnett Rosenberg, the drug's developer and a now-retired
professor, to complain that his work has "led to the creation of a lot
of selfish, money-hungry university personnel."



-- 
James Love  mailto:love@cptech.org http://www.cptech.org
Consumer Project on Technology, P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036
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