Pot-kettle? Local pharma in patent rush

Calling others sinners when they themselves are no saints?
Domestic drugmakers may challenge a Roche or a Novartis’ patent claim by filing oppositions and crying hoarse about trivial or ‘evergreening’ patenting, but when it comes to their own molecular or production-process tweaks, they haven’t been shy of laying innovation claims either.

Estimates show that in 2008-09 — that’s the latest data available — Indian companies such as Dr Reddys, Ranbaxy and Cadila Healthcare had filed over 500 applications with the Indian Patent Office.

Others such as Natco, Sun Pharma, Wockhardt and Cipla have also sought patent for key medicines crucial drugs such as imatinib mesylate (cancer), anastrozole (breast cancer), bicalutamide (prostrate cancer), pamidronate (osteoporosis), temozolomide (skin cancer/ brain tumuor), letrozole (breast cancer) and zoledronic acid (cancer/osteoporosis).

Industry experts said local players have been making these applications for different forms (molecular tweaks) of the drugs as well as for their manufacturing processes (the so-called ‘process patent’).

When filing patent claims, they consider such molecular twists as innovation. And some of them, like Cipla, Natco and Wockhardt, have simultaneously been filing oppositions to the patent applications by multinationals, alleging Big Pharma is trying to extend its monopoly by seeking “trivial” patents and charging that allowing this will keep medicines out of reach for the masses.

A healthcare expert in New Delhi, who did not wish to be named, said trivial patenting, which implies patent claims for minor changes in an existing invention, which both domestic firms and MNCs have been guilty of, is bad practice.

“The pharma industry should be encouraged to use competition to grow and keep prices down. Patents, on the other hand, cut off competition. Domestic companies are indulging in doublespeak by doing exactly what they have been protesting against,” the expert said.

Amit Sengupta, general secretary of All India Peoples Science Network, the non-government organisation spreading science education, concurs Indian pharma firms are also aggressive when it comes to claiming patents.

“Any kind of patent leads to monopoly as it eliminates competition and grants the patent holder the right to charge any amount for drugs. This keeps the product beyond the reach of patients,” Sengupta said.

Industry estimates have predicted that in five years, when the domestic market will be worth $20 billion, about 15% of the total medicines will be patented products.

The trend of Indian companies seeking patents would only increase in future, said experts. The trend started gathering momentum in 2005, when the Patent Act got amended as per World Trade Organisation norms, said Anuradha Salhotra, managing partner, Lall Lahiri & Salhotra, a New Delhi-based patent lawyers’ firm.

But an official from a domestic drug company which is at the forefront of both laying patent claims and opposing patent pleas by multinationals, says “whatever patent claims his company has made will not hamper access to medicines”.