Is the real problem that PCPs are reluctant to switch patients from a long prescribed product[Remicade], now off-patent, to a recently FDA-approved biosimilar, PFE's Inflectra, notwithstanding the lower price for Inflectra?
DJ Pfizer Files Antitrust Lawsuit Alleging J&J Thwarted Use of Biosimilar Rival to Remicade
By Jonathan D. Rockoff
Pfizer Inc. filed suit against Johnson & Johnson on Wednesday, alleging it has thwarted biosimilar competition to its arthritis drug Remicade by effectively preventing health insurers, hospitals and clinics from offering Pfizer's lower-priced copy.
The complaint, filed in federal court in Philadelphia, says J&J's "exclusionary contracts" have stopped hospitals and clinics from buying Pfizer's Inflectra biosimilar and health insurers from paying for prescriptions if they wanted rebates and other perks.
Pfizer has asked the federal district court to void the contracts and order J&J to pay damages compensating for lost sales.
The lawsuit is the first antitrust action to surface in the emerging market for biosimilars, after years of litigation over patents and timing of launches.
Biotech drugs, which are produced in living cells and typically infused or injected, have provided help to patients with conditions ranging from cancer to hepatitis C to multiple sclerosis. But they cost a lot, often more than $100,000 a year for a patient.
The 2010 health-care overhaul aimed to limit spending on drugs whose patents had expired by creating a regulatory framework for the approval of copies. Last April, Inflectra was among the first biosimilars to get the go-ahead. Pfizer began selling it at the end of the year.
A year's treatment on Remicade typically lists for $31,500, nearly $6,000 more than for Inflectra, according to SSR Health.
Write to Jonathan D. Rockoff at Jonathan.Rockoff@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
September 20, 2017 09:11 ET (13:11 GMT)
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