Last week's rejection by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office of four patents on Gilead Sciences' antiretroviral drug Viread might affect patent applications for the drug in India, the Times of India reports.
According to the Times of India, the PTO decision strengthens the opposition application filed in 2006 by the Indian Network for People Living With HIV/AIDS against patent applications filed by Gilead (Mukherjee, Times of India, 1/25).
Viread is known generically as tenofovir and is sold as part of Gilead's combination therapies Truvada and Atripla. The not-for-profit group Public Patent Foundation, or PUBPAT, last year submitted evidence to PTO that the scientific knowledge on which the four patents were based existed before Gilead held the patents. The foundation in its challenge to the patents submitted prior knowledge that Gilead had not disclosed to PTO during the patent application process. In its challenge, PUBPAT said that the prior knowledge would have prevented PTO from issuing the patents.
Gilead has the right to respond to the PTO decision, and the patents will be protected while Gilead responds (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 1/24).