Manila filed a petition today to cancel Pfizer’s Norvasc patent US court invalidated it last month and allowed a generic version on the market. The Philippine International Trading Corp., the government agency in charge of importing pharmaceuticals, argued before the Intellectual Property Office that the Norvasc patent shouldn’t have been granted to Pfizer Limited, the UK-based branch of Pfizer Inc., in 1990 because it was not a new product.

PITC acting head Teddy Rivera said voiding Pfizer’s patent on the drug — with annual sales of $31 million — would mean savings of up to $2 million a month for Filipino consumers, who could buy the cheaper, generic version of the medicine.

Cancellation of the patent before its scheduled expiry in June would also lead to the early dismissal of a lawsuit filed by Pfizer against PITC and the Bureau of Food and Drugs for patent infringement, Rivera told a news conference.

The suit was filed last year after the drugs bureau approved PITC’s import registration for the drug from Pakistan, which is nearly four times cheaper than Pfizer’s selling price of 95 cents for Norvasc.

Source: The Associated Press.

Background reading: Second View[tags]Compulsory Licensing, Generics, Norvasc, Patents, Pfizer, Philippines[/tags]