Court Orders Continued Production of Namenda

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[ABSTRACT]

Yesterday a federal judge in New York ordered the pharmaceutical company Actavis to continue manufacturing the original formulation of Namenda until the anti-trust case brought by the New York Attorney General is decided. Actavis announced immediately after the court hearing that it would appeal the ruling on an emergency basis.

TWO FORMS OF NAMENDA

As reported here last fall, Namenda is used to slow the progression of Alzheimer’s disease among those with moderate to severe symptoms. The original formulation is designed to be taken twice a day, and each pill contains 10 mgs of the active ingredient. In 2009, Forest Labs (which was acquired by Actavis last year) obtained a new patent for Namenda XR, an extended release version that needs only be taken once a day at a dosage of 28 mgs per pill.

The patent protection for the original Namenda expires in the summer of 2015. At that point, pharmacists will automatically fill prescriptions for Namenda with a generic equivalent, unless the treating physician specifies that the pharmacist is to make no substitutions. Namenda currently has $1.5 billion in annual sales. It is estimated that once Namenda looses its patent protection, sales of the drug will plunge by 90%.

ACTAVIS’ STRATEGY TO FORCE A SWITCH TO ITS NEW VERSION

To prevent the loss of these revenues, Actavis announced this summer that it would stop manufacturing Namenda in the fall of 2014. Since generic substitutes will not be available until the summer of 2015, this announcement forced physicians to start writing prescriptions for Namenda XR, so that patients would still be able to take a form of Namenda. Actavis is betting that once patients switch to the extended release form of the drug, they will not make the effort or even know that in July they can call their physicians and request a new prescription for the original Namenda and get it for a fraction of its current price.

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