Can a medicinal product have more than one patent?
Yes. Pharmaceutical products are covered by a number of patents, sometimes by as many as 30 to 40 patents or more. In addition, a patent on a new use (“indication”), formulation, salt or ester can block the registration or marketing of a generic medicine for treatments where the base patent has already expired. This is a strategy known as “evergreening” which aims to prevent or delay competition from generic medicines by extending market protection through patents on minor changes to the original product.
