"This case is about safeguarding incentives for better medicines so that patients' needs will be met in the future," says Eric Althoff, a Novartis spokesman.
International drug companies have accused India of disregarding intellectual property rights, and have pushed for stronger patent protection that would weaken India's generics industry.
Earlier this year, an Indian manufacturer was allowed to produce a far cheaper version of the kidney and liver cancer treatment sorefinib, manufactured by Bayer Corp.
Bayer was selling the drug for about $5,600 a month. Natco, the Indian company, said its generic version would cost $175 a month, less than 1/30th as much. Natco was ordered to pay 6 percent in royalties to Bayer.
Novartis says the outcome of the new case will not affect the availability of generic versions of Glivec because it is covered by a grandfather clause in India's patent law. Only the more easily absorbed drug would be affected, Althoff said, adding that its own generic business, Sandoz, produces cheap versions of its drugs for millions across the globe.
Public health activists say the question goes beyond Glivec to whether drug companies should get special protection for minor tweaks to medicines that others could easily have uncovered.
"We're looking to the Supreme Court to tell Novartis it won't open the floodgates and allow abusive patenting practices," said Eldred Tellis, of the Sankalp Rehabilitation Centre, a private group working with HIV patients.
The court's decision is expected to be a landmark that will influence future drug accessibility and price across the developing world.
"We're already paying very high prices for some of the new drugs that are patented in India," said Petros Isaakidis, an epidemiologist with Doctors Without Borders. "If Novartis wins, even older medicines could be subject to patenting again, and it will become much more difficult for us in future to provide medicines to our patients being treated for HIV, hepatitis and drug resistant TB."
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