Colombia to challenge AIDS drug patents

Colombia, which is home to a $4.8 billion pharma market, will soon decide whether to authorize price-cutting generic competition with a critical patented AIDS drug, directly challenging pharmaceutical industry power under a new health ministry resolution in one of the hemisphere’s most influential states.

In anticipation of the decision, more than 120 civil society organizations and prominent individuals wrote to Colombian Minister of Health Guillermo Alfonso Jaramillo in support of expanding access to dolutegravir, calling the move a “stand for health justice.”

The health ministry resolution proposes “compulsory licenses” allowing Colombia to make or import generic dolutegravir (trade name Tivicay) without permission from the patent owner, ViiV Healthcare (majority-owned by GSK (LSE: GSK). Dolutegravir is recommended as the preferred first-line treatment for people living with HIV, including pregnant women, as per the guidance of the World Health Organization.