Monday April 1, 2013 was my first day of work at MSF. It was also a landmark day in the International Health Care World as the Indian Supreme Court rejected the Novartis Patent Case. When I first entered the office I could tell something was going on. Men and women were running in and out of colleagues' offices notifying them of the triumphant news.
Novartis created a new version of the cancer medicine, Glivec, and tried to patent it. Novartis was denied this attempt because it violated Section 3(d) of India's patent law. Section 3(d) states that patents will not be granted for modifications of preexisting drugs, only for truly "genuine inventions" according to an article in the Huffington Post. In a MSF press release Dr. Unni Karunakara, MSF's international president said, “This is a huge relief for the millions of patients and doctors in developing countries who depend on affordable medicines from India, and for treatment providers like MSF. The Supreme Court's decision now makes patents on the medicines that we desperately need less likely. This marks the strongest possible signal to Novartis and other multinational pharmaceutical companies that they should stop seeking to attack the Indian patent law.”
The Novartis case brought the publicity that MSF needed to educate ordinary citizens of the wrongs they are trying to right.
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