LANSING, MI (WHTC) – Michigan will share in a $125 million multi-state settlement of a class-action lawsuit claiming that a biopharmaceutical company blocked the generic production of a drug simply for economic gain.
State Attorney General Bill Schuette says that over $3.3 million will be doled out in Michigan to individuals and agencies who had to pay more to get Provigil, a treatment for narcolepsy and sleep apnea.
The litigation claimed that maker Cephalon intentionally defrauded the US Patent and Trademark Office to secure an additional patent near the expiration of the initial Provigil patent, giving them a monopoly of the drug for more than a decade. A court subsequently determined that the additional patent was invalid and unenforceable.
This settlement is subject to court review.
