Ovation sued by FTC over drug
from times wire services
Antitrust enforcers accused Ovation Pharmaceuticals Inc. of cornering the U.S. market on a drug for a congenital heart defect in premature infants and asked a court to break up the company’s monopoly on the medication.
Ovation imposed a 1,300% price increase for the drug Indocin IV soon after it acquired the U.S. rights to NeoProfen, the only other drug used to treat the potentially fatal defect, the Federal Trade Commission said.
The FTC filed suit in federal court in Minnesota to force privately held Ovation, which is based in Deerfield, Ill., to sell the rights to one of the drugs and repay to purchasers all unlawfully obtained profit from the monopoly since early 2006.
