Drugmakers Still Pay to Keep Generics Off Market, FTC Says

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-11-04/drugmakers-still-pay-to-keep-generics-off-market-ftc-says.html

November 04, 2011, 4:56 PM EDT

Oct. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Brand-name drugmakers are continuing an “anticompetitive” trend of paying generic-drug manufacturers to delay introducing their lower-cost products, according to a Federal Trade Commission report.

Drug companies completed 28 potential deals to delay generics in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, according to the report released today. That’s just under the record of 31 such agreements in the previous fiscal year, the FTC said.

The commission has been pressing Congress and the courts to limit the deals, which the FTC said delay the introduction of cheaper drugs. Drugmakers have said that the agreements cut legal costs and in some cases speed up the introduction of the less-expensive drugs.

“While a lot of companies don’t engage in pay-for-delay settlements, the ones that do increase prescription drug costs for consumers and the government each year,” FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said in a statement.

The 28 deals involved 25 different brand-name drugs with combined U.S. sales of more than $9 billion, according to the FTC. The agreements, which drugmakers are required to report to the FTC, are otherwise confidential, said Mitchell Katz, a commission spokesman.

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