The Supreme Court's Judgment in Eli Lilly v Actavis UK Ltd and Others: how to understand it and why it is important
The Middlesex Guildhall, Site of the Supreme Court Photo Christine Smith Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 4.0 International Licence Source Wikipedia Jane Lambert Supreme Court (Lords Neuberger, Mance, Clarke, Sumption and Hodge) Eli Lilly v Actavis UK Ltd and others [2017] UKSC 48 (12 July 2017) What the Appeal was about The pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and Co ( "Lilly" ) has developed a drug called pemetrexed which it markets under the brand name Alimta for the treatment of various types of cancer. Used on its own, pemetrexed has unpleasant side effects that can sometimes be fatal but these can be avoided when it is administered as a compound called pemetrexed disodium in combination with vitamin B12. The use of pemetrexed disodium in the manufacture of a medicament for use in combination with vitamin B12 (and, optionally, folic acid) for the treatment of cancer is monopolized in the United K...