The use of generic medications for hepatitis C.

Hepatitis C, hepatitis B, HIV, TB and malaria are the five major causes of infectious disease death worldwide. In a breakthrough that rivals the invention of penicillin, drugs that cure hepatitis C, with minimal side effects and high success rates, have reached the market, but, in what must be one of the greatest tragedies of modern times, these life-saving medications are not being deployed on a mass scale. Pharmaceutical patents are gifted to private corporations by governments for the dual purposes of protecting R&D expenditure and encouraging innovation. Unfortunately the monopoly pricing power these patents provision currently lacks adequate checks and balances, is open to abuse, and is quite clearly being abused. The sort of legislative changes required to deliver on the original goals of pharmaceutical patents will take years or even decades to eventuate. Parallel importation of generic medication offers hope to the millions of patients with HCV unable to afford access to vastly overpriced originator medications. Doctors prescribing and monitoring patients taking generics can take comfort from the fact that the REDEMPTION trial results show, like the HIV generics that came before them, that HCV generics deliver robust clinical results.