Mylan, Clinton seek to lower price of ARV drugs for HIV and AIDS

PITTSBURGH A generic drug maker and a former U.S. president will collaborate to lower the price of a treatment for patients with drug-resistant HIV in developing countries.

Mylan announced Thursday an agreement with former president Bill Clinton to enable more effective and affordable treatments for patients using second-line antiretroviral therapies for HIV and AIDS in the developing world, making a second-line regimen of four ARV drugs available for less than $500 a year.

Mylan and subsidiary Matrix will make available four drugs – atazanavir, ritonavir, tenofovir and lamivudine – for once-daily treatment of patients who have developed resistance to standard, first-line ARVs. The four drugs will be available in three drugs, with tenofovir and lamivudine combined into a single pill. Matrix will begin selling the pills together in a single package for $425 a year starting in 2010 in countries whose governments are members of the Clinton Foundation’s Procurement Consortium across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean.