<div>Auto companies regularly soup up existing models of their cars and sell them to consumers in a new avatar. But the companies do not call it a new car. <br /><br />Global pharma companies on the other hand are busy tweaking best selling drugs and selling them as new products. On top of it, they claim moral advantage by seeking monopoly pricing on it. <br /><br />While they crow about the newly tweaked drug, they also ensure that patients can’t buy it at normal prices. <br /><br />Patent laws allow pharma companies to claim a 20-year monopoly pricing regime to compensate for the effort and resources invested in creating a new drug. Unfortunately, many drug companies have been misusing these laws for what is called “ever greening”. <br /><br />These companies keep making changes in the composition of the drug to renew the patent on it for almost perpetually.<br /><br />The Supreme Court of India’s ruling on the Novartis case has given a much needed jolt to the practice. Novartis has spent the last seven years convincing the courts that its blood cancer drug Glivec is a new invention. The government and activists said that it was a tweaked version of its older medicine Imanitib. Novartis claims that the new drug “represents a 30 per cent increase in the bioavailability of the medicine.” <br /><br />Really Novartis? Effectively this means that it has increased the strength of the medicine. And for this it wants monopoly pricing for another 20 years at a time when generic drug makers are selling the same medicine at a fraction of the Novartis price.<br /><br />Ever-greening has been the bug bear of activists and governments the world over. It was created by smart lawyers, greedy CEOs and lazy pharma companies. <br /><br />Congratulations are due to the government of India and the Supreme Court for protecting the interests of patients and also the spirit of patent laws. <br /><br />The patent laws rightly allow companies to benefit from their effort. It is the misuse that is being fought. Novartis CEO Ranjit Shahani is trying to scare the government by saying that innovation would stop in India. If innovation means minor tweaking of medicines that benefit the company more than the patient, then it is better to stop it. <br /><br />Nobody is convinced that increasing the strength of a medicine is an innovation worth patenting. Why don’t Shahani, Novartis and other big pharma companies read the judgement carefully? The court says categorically that its drug is “not a new invention”. The court, government and the law welcome genuine innovation. Not questionable claims. <br /><br />The Supreme Court has done India a great service by upholding the sanctity of patent laws. The court has sent a message to the world that India will not tolerate undermining of laws by the brute strength of big pharma companies. <br /><br />This should actually encourage genuine innovation in India. Patents for new inventions will be protected. But fake claims will be thrown out. <br /><br />The last few years have seen an increasing presence of global pharma companies in India. Ranbaxy has been bought by Daiichi Sankyo of Japan and Nicholas Piramal by Abbott Labs. Many smaller Indian pharma companies are on the block.<br /> <br />Global pharma companies must realise that buying domestic companies will not give them the automatic right to evergreen drugs and fleece consumers. <br /><br />They will have to create a model where compensation for innovation is balanced by the interests of consumers. <br /><br />Government and activists have supported pharma industry in the fight against fake medicines. But no one will support pharma companies in their fake claims of innovation. <br /><br />They would do well to learn from the auto industry. After all the auto industry does not increase the engine strength of a car and claim that it is a totally new creation. <br /><br /> <br /><em>(Pranjal Sharma is a senior business writer. He can be contacted at pranjalx@gmail.com)</em></div>
