Novartis has several patents on Gleevec, but generally the main patent expires in 2015 (it was extended from the original expiration date of 2013). As mentioned, it was granted "orphan drug" status, meaning that since it has a relatively small population that requires such a drug. Patent law is more favorable to companies that invest in development of new drugs to fill these "orphan drug" needs.
By the way, this also explains something about Sprycel and Tasigna. Sprycel is made by a competitor of Novartis (Bristol Myers Squibb), so it had to work differently than Gleevec, and it does. But Tasigna is made by Novartis, and it works like Gleevec, only with a stronger binding capability. If Tasigna had been made by another company, it would have violated the Novartis Gleevec patent. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ [CMLHope] A support group of http://cmlhope.com ------------------------------------------------- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "CMLHope" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/CMLHope -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
