Call for CL and cheaper TB drugs grows louder in India

30 March 2021

As the call for compulsory licenses on two new tuberculosis (TB) drugs gets louder in India, the Bombay High Court has directed the government to decide on the representations made seeking non-commercial licenses for the two patented life-saving anti TB drugs: bedaquiline and delamanid, which offer fresh hope to multi-drug resistant (MDR) or extensive-drug resistant (XDR) TB patients. The Court has directed the government to take a decision by April 28, reports The Pharma Letter’s India correspondent.

A division bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Girish Kulkarni was hearing the public interest litigation (PIL) filed by TB survivor Meera Yadav and Jan Swasthya Abhiyan, a non-government organization. The PIL was filed as the drugs, patents of which are solely with the government, are not available regularly, resulting in a break in the treatment regime for the near-fatal ailment.

The petition notes bedaquiline and delamanid, together with repurposed drugs linezolid and clofazimine, provide opportunities to cure people with MDR TB.

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