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Researchers Work Around Hepatitis Drug Patent

Posted by kdawson on from the academia-vs.-big-pharma dept.

Several readers let us know about a pair of British researchers who found a workaround to patents covering drugs used to treat hepatitis C. The developers intend to produce a drug cheap enough to supply to people in the poorest parts of the world. The scientists found another way to bind a sugar to interferon, producing a drug they say should be as long-lasting and effective as those sold (at $14,000 for a year's supply) by patent holders Hoffman-La Roche and Schering Plough. Clinical trials could begin by 2008. The article quotes developer Sunil Shaunak of Imperial College London: "We in academic medicine can either choose to use our ideas to make large sums of money for small numbers of people, or to look outwards to the global community and make affordable medicines."

4 of 298 comments (clear)

  1. Thumbs up! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Before the arguments about the effectiveness of this drug compared to the patented one, the morality of patents on medicine and the soviet russia jokes break out; I'd like to show my respect for these people. It's great to see this effort!

  2. Big Pharm does this too by Heir+Of+The+Mess · · Score: 5, Interesting

    For example Australian company Biota created and patented Relenza for treating bird flu, then Roche modified their product slightly to produce and patent Tamiflu.

    --
    Australian running a company that does C# / C++ / Java / SQL / Python / Mathematica
  3. See? by Digital+Vomit · · Score: 4, Interesting

    See? Patents do encourage innovation!...by forcing others to work around existing patents. :-P

    --
    Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
  4. Re:$1,000 per capsule. by Quiet_Desperation · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Are you sure it was really $1000? That's $365,000 a year. The most expensive currently marketed drug is Cerezyme at $175,000 a year, and that's for some weird genetic disorder that only, like 5000 people on the planet suffer from.