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Lets return to combination therapy and the announcement of 1 February 2023 where the observation was made that dystrophin restoration drugs have yet to demonstrate in controlled clinical studies a slowing of the loss of ambulation beyond use of corticosteroids. Of course combination therapy is a mainstay of medical treatment for a wide range of diseases and degenerative conditions. Physicians for instance might prescribe a range of treatments to treat tumors including chemotherapy, checkpoint inhibitors and oncolytic viruses. More to the point in DMD, dystrophin restoration drugs are combined with corticosteroids.

Riddle me this. Could patents be used to protect the use of combination treatment regimens?

For instance, where dystrophin restoration drugs were deficient in improving patient outcomes, the drugs future could hinge upon the approval of complementary medicine. Lets call this the backdoor approach where a biotech or pharma company wait for another drug to be approved to bolster their own drug through combination therapy. No capital outflows or the expenditure of running combination trials, just patiently wait. Physicians treating patients would make all the decisions in combining different drugs to achieve better outcomes. . Returning to the announcement of 1 February 2023, ANP advised that a provisional patent application was filed to seek protection of the combination of ATL1102 with the dystrophin restoration/exon skipping drugs.

Is there a latch on the backdoor with a combination lock? I don't really know and would be interested in understanding if the patent outlined by ANP could create the opportunity for dialogue and negotiation on more favourable terms?