Opinion: Allergan invokes the victim defense to protect a brand-name drug from a generic challenge
Allergan, a multibillion-dollar drug corporation, is attempting to perpetrate a fraud on the American people that would make Bernie Madoff blush — even as it casts itself as a victim.
Allergan makes several products, including Restasis, a very expensive brand-name drug that people with dry eye and related conditions take to increase tear production. Failure to treat this condition can impair vision and even lead to blindness.
Allergan is using an unprecedented legal ploy to keep a cheaper generic of Restasis from for Restasis to the Saint Regis Mohawk tribe in upstate New York. By doing so, it aims to sidestep what’s called , a type of patent challenge that is easier and faster to file than a lawsuit. As a sovereign tribal government, the Saint Regis Mohawk tribe claims immunity in inter partes review proceedings.
