Médecins Sans Frontières urges the Indian Patent Office to reject the secondary patent application filed by Johnson & Johnson to prevent the company from extending its monopoly on bedaquiline beyond the primary patent’s expiry in July 2023.

With newer TB drugs to go off patent in 2023, MSF calls on Johnson & Johnson, Otsuka, and TB Alliance to remove additional barriers blocking generic manufacturers from entering the market.

A shortage of TB tests at this critical juncture will be disastrous.

In an article published in the journal BMJ Global Health, authors from the Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) Access Campaign analyse the development and approval of two newer drugs for treating drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB), bedaquiline and delamanid, in the current pharmaceutical research and development (R&D) paradigm, and the failure of the regulatory approval process to define the drugs’ role in multidrug regimens to improve treatment outcomes.

BOSTON/PARIS, 18 October 2021 — Hundreds of patient volunteers from four continents have enrolled in a trial that aims to find safer, shorter, and effective treatments for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), an airborne, infectious disease that has grown resistant to standard medications. A group of scientists and clinicians led by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), Partners In Health (PIH) and Interactive Research and Development (IRD) make up the endTB consortium conducting the groundbreaking study funded by Unitaid. 

Médecins Sans Frontières released a new issue brief, Local diagnostics to meet local health needs, with recommendations how to improve local production of diagnostics in low- and middle-income countries.

New Delhi/Geneva, 20 April 2021 – Next week the Indian government is expected to decide whether it is willing to override patents on two critical tuberculosis (TB) drugs following a court petition filed at the Mumbai High Court by two survivors of TB and activists. If the government is willing to issue the ‘compulsory licenses,’ it would increase access to the newer TB drugs bedaquiline and delamanid for people with multidrug-resistant (MDR) and extensively drug-resistant (XDR) TB in India. The international medical humanitarian organisation Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) supports the court petition and urges the Indian government to take this critical step that would allow price-lowering competition among generic manufacturers for drug-resistant (DR) TB medicines in India.

-- A clinical trial testing a shorter regimen for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) has stopped enrolling patients early.
-- The trial, sponsored by MSF, has stopped randomising patients because of data which has indicated the trial regimen’s superior outcomes over existing regimens.
-- We hope the data, which will be submitted for peer review, will lead to WHO to change recommendations for MDR-TB treatment.

Médecins Sans Frontières conducted a webinar on 25 November 2020 reviewing the findings of the recently released report Step Up for TB 2020: Tuberculosis Policies in 37 Countries.

Data on 37 countries reveals widespread failure to follow latest international recommendations for policies on prevention, diagnosis, and treatment.