BGMA welcomes EU General Court ruling against AstraZeneca

Commenting on the EU General Court’s ruling that AstraZeneca had acted anti-competitively to prevent or delay the launch of generic omeprazole, BGMA Director Warwick Smith said:

“We very much welcome the Court’s ruling. Its findings are consistent with those of the European Commission’s inquiry into the pharmaceutical sector and our own experience that the research based pharmaceutical industry uses a tool kit of devices to prevent generic launch when the patents on its drugs expire. This costs the NHS many millions of pounds and diverts the research based industry from its true task of developing new medicines that patients need. So society pays more for less. We applaud the competition authorities for taking enforcement action against this sort of abuse and urge them to continue doing so.”