In a setback to AIDS activists, a federal court jury on Friday cleared Gilead Sciences and Teva Pharmaceuticals of allegations that the companies struck an illegal deal that inflated prices for HIV medicines.
A lawsuit filed four years ago accused Gilead of using a range of controversial business tactics that led the U.S. health care system to overspend for HIV medicines. These included so-called pay-to-delay settlements of patent litigation and moves that purportedly stalled development of safer versions of medicines that had years left of patent protection.
The actions allegedly stemmed from different agreements that Gilead, which dominates the market for HIV medicines, reached with other drugmakers. Due to their complex nature, though, the litigation was split into two different trials. The first trial, which began in May in a federal court in San Francisco, involved a deal between Gilead and Teva, which is one of the largest purveyors of generic drugs.
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