By Emily Michiko Morris & Douglas Park
The high cost of some pharmaceuticals is a complex issue, but the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC’s) most recent criticism of pharmaceutical patents’ role is misguided. The FTC has criticized the listing of drug product device patents in the FDA’s “Orange Book,” a listing of patents related to various FDA-approved drug products. Read more
Executive summary: Many critics of pharmaceutical companies argue that they abuse the patent system through “evergreening” or “thickets” to increase the amount of time they can avoid generic competition and keep drug prices high.
In their forthcoming
Courts have recently questioned Food and Drug Administration (FDA) determinations. The FDA is the administrative agency whose job is to evaluate scientific data to determine if a drug is safe and effective enough to be approved, and post-approval, to continue to evaluate such data to determine if a drug should remain available.
By Austin Shaffer