NIH re­jects an­oth­er at­tempt to 'march-in' on Astel­las' prostate can­cer drug over ex­ces­sive price

The Na­tion­al In­sti­tutes of Health has again de­clined to use so-called “march-in” rights to low­er the price of Astel­las and Pfiz­er’s prostate can­cer drug Xtan­di de­spite be­ing in­vent­ed at UCLA with grants from the US Army and NIH.

“Giv­en the re­main­ing patent life and the lengthy ad­min­is­tra­tive process in­volved for a march-in pro­ceed­ing, NIH does not be­lieve that use of the march-in au­thor­i­ty would be an ef­fec­tive means of low­er­ing the price of the drug,” NIH told prostate can­cer pa­tients Robert Sachs and Clare Love, in a let­ter shared with End­points News. The in­sti­tutes’ analy­ses found Xtan­di “to be wide­ly avail­able to the pub­lic,” an in­di­ca­tion that there was not a press­ing need for the US to act.

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