Generic Brands

At least three generic versions of the popular osteoporosis treatment Fosamax are headed for pharmacy shelves with the expiration of the drug's main patent Wednesday, bringing patients hefty savings. Two of the biggest makers of generic drugs, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. and Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc., said Wednesday they would immediately begin selling generic Fosamax, which is made by Merck & Co.

In the contentious debate over insuring Americans' health, the value of generic prescription drugs is a rare point of consensus. Patients, physicians, employers, politicians -- all hail generics as powerful treatment for a swelling healthcare tab. On average, these copycat medicines cost less than a third of the brand-name drugs they mimic. In turn, the competition they provide drives down the cost of those first-to-market drugs.

In carrying out its mission to ensure that generic drugs are "the same medicine" with "the same results" as the pioneer drugs they follow, the Food and Drug Administration rigidly applies a standard of what is called "bioequivalence." Measured in laboratories and in simple, small-scale human trials, a generic must deliver the same active ingredient to the bloodstream of patients in virtually the same amount at virtually the same rate as the pioneer drug.

One of the nation's largest drugstore chains ratcheted up a price war Thursday, offering deep discounts on generic prescriptions amid national concern about the spiraling cost of healthcare. Drugstore giant CVS Caremark Corp. announced it would sell 90-day supplies of more than 400 medications for $9.99 and offer discounts for cash-paying patients at its in-store medical clinics. The price war was unleashed by Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the country's largest retailer, a few years ago.

Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. and Sanofi-Aventis won an appeals court ruling Friday that will help them block generic competition to the blood thinner Plavix, the world's No. 2 selling-drug, in the U.S. until 2011. Bristol-Myers and Sanofi said that as a result of the ruling by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, they will seek reimbursement from Canadian drug maker Apotex Inc.

Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. will ask a U.S. court to stop generic versions of its bestselling drug Plavix, four months after ousting its chief executive for bungling a deal to delay copycat versions of the medicine. Bristol-Myers and Sanofi-Aventis, France's biggest drug maker, will urge a federal judge to uphold the patent on Plavix, a blood thinner, in a trial set to begin Monday in New York. Apotex Inc.

Patients and health insurance providers could save at least $71 billion over 10 years if there was a regulatory mechanism that allowed for the marketing of generic biotech medicines, according to a study being released today. Currently there is no legal pathway that allows generic drug makers to produce biotech medicines, so the high-cost treatments, which are derived from a living source such as proteins, have never had to compete with copycat products that drive pharmaceutical costs lower.

Biovail Corp. reached a settlement with four generic-drug makers that delays sales of cheaper copies of one form of its antidepressant Wellbutrin XL until next year. The deal resolves complaints against Anchen Pharmaceuticals, Impax Laboratories Inc., Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. and Watson Pharmaceuticals Inc., Mississauga, Canada-based Biovail said Monday. Biovail reported $302.2 million in Wellbutrin XL sales for the first nine months of 2006, or 42% of the company's product revenue.

Pfizer Inc. won a court ruling Tuesday blocking Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. from marketing a generic version of the painkiller Celebrex, the world's top-selling arthritis drug, until 2015. U.S. District Judge John Lifland in Newark, N.J., upheld the validity of three Pfizer patents covering the drug after hearing arguments during a two-week trial in November. "The patents are neither invalid nor unenforceable, and Teva has infringed the patents," Lifland wrote in a 201-page ruling.

Pfizer Inc.'s patent on the hypertension drug Norvasc was invalidated by an appeals court Thursday, opening the way for generic competition to the company's second-biggest seller. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington held invalid the patent on the drug's key ingredient, amlodipine besylate, overturning a January 2006 ruling by District Judge James M. Rosenbaum in Chicago.