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Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Teva profits by "flouting drug patents": report

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., Israel's most valuable company, whose U.S. operations are based in Chester County, "turned itself into the world's biggest maker of generic medicines through a high-risk strategy of flouting drug patents," writes Bloomberg News.

Targets include AstraZeneca's Pulmicort asthma medicine, Sanofi-Aventis's allergy drugs Allegra-D and Nasacort, and, possibly soon, Eli Lilly's Evista osteoperosis treatment. "Teva... risks paying billions of dollars in legal damages by taking a calculated legal gamble: It begins selling copies while patents on a drug are still being disputed in court... The company has pulled off the maneuver 13 times since 2004, helping double annual revenue to $9.41 billion. The strategy gets cheaper, copycat drugs to patients quicker as governments and employers are demanding relief from record health-care costs."

Story at

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aS52SijhbcTQ&refer=exclusive

Posted by Joseph N. DiStefano @ 6:51 AM  Permalink | Post a comment
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About Joseph N. DiStefano
Joseph N. DiStefano writes this blog to feed his PhillyDeals column, which is printed in the business pages of The Philadelphia Inquirer every Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Joe has worked at the Inquirer, mostly, since 1988. He has also written for Bloomberg and Gannett, authored the book Comcasted, majored in economics at Penn, and fathered six children. Reach Joe at 215-854-5194 and JoeD@phillynews.com

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