Tag: Prescription Drugs

The FTC filed a complaint in federal district court charging Shire ViroPharma Inc. with violating the antitrust laws by abusing government processes to delay generic competition to its branded prescription drug, Vancocin HCl Capsules. The complaint alleges that to maintain its monopoly, ViroPharma waged a campaign of serial, repetitive, and unsupported filings with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and courts to delay the FDA’s approval of generic Vancocin Capsules, and exclude competition. According to the FTC, ViroPharma submitted 43 filings with the FDA and filed three lawsuits against the FDA between 2006 and 2012. According to the FTC, ViroPharma knew that it was the FDA’s practice to refrain from approving any generic applications until it resolved any pending relevant citizen petition filings. Viropharma intended for its serial filings to delay the approval of generics, and thus competition and lower prices. The FTC seeks a court order permanently prohibiting ViroPharma from submitting repetitive and baseless filings with the FDA and the courts, and from similar and related conduct as well as any other necessary equitable relief, including restitution and disgorgement.

The FTC required Grifols, S.A., a manufacturer of plasma-derived drugs, to make significant divestitures as part of a settlement allowing Grifols to acquire a leading plasma-derived drug manufacturer, Talecris Biotherapeutics Holdings Corp. It resolves FTC charges that Grifols’ proposed acquisition of Talecris would be anticompetitive and would violate federal antitrust laws. As part of the settlement, Grifols will sell the Talecris fractionation facility in Melville, New York, and Grifols’ plasma collection centers in Mobile, Alabama, and Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to Kedrion S.p.A. Kedrion is a manufacturer of plasma-derived products in Europe and other markets, and will be a new entrant in the U.S. plasma-derived products industry. Grifols also will manufacture three plasma-derived products for Kedrion for several years under a manufacturing agreement. The FTC approved a final order on July 22, 2011.

Mallinckrodt ARD Inc., formerly known as Questcor Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and its parent company, Mallinckrodt plc, agreed to pay $100 million to settle charges that they violated the antitrust laws when Questcor acquired the rights to a drug that threatened its monopoly in the U.S. market for adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) drugs. Acthar is a specialty drug used as a treatment for infantile spasms, a rare seizure disorder afflicting infants, as well a drug of last resort used to treat other serious medical conditions. The complaint alleges that, while benefitting from an existing monopoly over the only U.S. ACTH drug, Acthar, Questcor illegally acquired the U.S. rights to develop a competing drug, Synacthen Depot. The acquisition stifled competition by preventing any other company from using the Synacthen assets to develop a synthetic ACTH drug, preserving Questcor’s monopoly and allowing it to maintain extremely high prices for Acthar. In addition to the $100 million monetary payment, the proposed stipulated court order, which must be approved by the federal court, requires that Questcor grant a license to develop Synacthen Depot to treat infantile spasms and nephrotic syndrome to a licensee approved by the Commission.