The Supreme Court`s landmark decision to reject Swiss company Novartis to patent a new version of its cancer drug, Glivec has put poor Indians in to festive mood. Medicines Sans Frontiers,a charity has hailed it as a victory for poor patients not just in India but throughout the world.
The Supreme Court argued that Novartis had to demonstrate that Glivec represented more than just a small improvement to an existing substance. In its ruling, the court said it wanted to discourage "repetitive patenting" under Section 3D of India’s patent laws
The generic drug makers in India who supply cheap medicines to poor people across the developing world have received major boost from this decision.
However,Novartis said the Supreme Court’s ruling "discourages future innovation".
Indian authorities are in denial of the firm’s plea on the grounds that the updated version was only slightly different from the last one
India exports $11bn (£7.23bn) of generic drugs including crucial anti-retroviral supplied to Africa.
There were concerns that, if granted, a patent could threaten access to cheap generic types of life-saving drugs in poor countries.
Monday’s Apex court order is being looked upon by the experts as an example setter for the so-called "patent cliff “or the expiry of pharmaceutical patents.
Estimated drugs with combined annual sales of $150bn will go off-patent by 2015 and will let companies in India to earn in profits worth millions of dollars.
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