MSF Hearing On Opposition To Pfizer Pneumonia Patent In India

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF, Doctors Without Borders) filed a patent opposition in March in India to prevent Pfizer from patenting a pneumonia drug and will defend its position in a hearing tomorrow at the Indian Patent Office.

According to the non-governmental organisation, the patent sought by the United States company Pfizer on the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine is unmerited and should be rejected.

MSF used a pre-grant opposition to challenge the patent arguing that “Simply adding 6 serotypes to a widely-used carrier protein (CRM197), in order to conjugate 13 serotypes of streptococcus pneumonia into a single carrier represents a step that is considered ‘obvious’ to skilled vaccine developers,” according to an MSF release.

According to MSF, the pneumonia vaccine is the world’s best-selling vaccine, yielding Pfizer over US$6 billion in sales annually [clarified]. One vaccine producer in India announced that it could supply the pneumonia vaccine for US$6 per child to public health programmes and humanitarian organisations, the release said. This is almost half the current lowest global price of US$10 per child, only available to a limited number of developing countries through donor funding via Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

MSF noted that an equivalent patent to the one opposed in India was revoked by the European Patent Office (EPO) and is currently being challenged in South Korea. The EU revocation is under appeal process, they said.