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Friday, December 21, 2012

Supreme Court slates generic drug 'pay-for-delay' case


By Joe Carlson
ModernHealthcare.com
Posted: December 8, 2012

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments in a "pay-for-delay" case that has the Federal Trade Commission accusing generic drugmakers of violating competition laws by agreeing to accept $42 million in annual payments in exchange for not selling generic versions of a more-expensive brand-name testosterone gel.

The FTC says (PDF) the companies—lead respondent Watson Pharmaceuticals, along with Paddock Laboratories, Par Pharmaceutical Cos. and Abbott Laboratories subsidiary Solvay Pharmaceuticals—conspired illegally to keep cheaper drugs off the market, to the detriment of consumers of the brand-name drug.

The companies, meanwhile, say their actions were legal and immune from FTC scrutiny (PDF). However, they did not oppose a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, because they said differing interpretations of federal law had led to split legal reasoning in various U.S. circuits on a controversy of national significance.

The entire story is here.