India Overturns Patent On AIDS Patient Drug

The Chennai Patent Office in India last week overturned the patent on Valganciclovir, an expensive drug used to prevent an infection to which people with HIV/AIDS or organ recipients are susceptible, an Indian lawyers’ group said today. The patent office decided that the patent held by Swiss company Roche lacked inventive step and did not satisfy the requirement of showing increased therapeutic efficacy as required under section 3(d) of the Indian patent law. A copy of the decision is available here [pdf].

Anand Grover of the Lawyers Collective HIV/AIDS Unit, who represented several opposing patients’ groups, said in a press release, “This also underscores the importance of oppositions in ensuring that the Patent Office interprets the patentability criteria strictly to prevent new forms of old drugs from being patented. This decision will have implications for patients not only in India but also in other developing countries.”

The Chennai Patent Office in 2007 had granted the patent, which was then set aside by the Madras High Court on challenge from AIDS advocacy groups who had been denied pre-grant opposition. The Indian Supreme Court then decided the groups could intervene in post-grant opposition.