French Court Dismisses AstraZeneca Complaint Against French Health Insurer Regarding CRESTOR

According to the French news service Agence France-Presse (AFP), a French appeals court has dismissed a complaint by European pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca against French health insurers, who advised doctors to be sparing when prescrib­ing one of the com­pany’s top drugs, rosu­vastatin (CRESTOR).

The pharmaceutical giant had brought a complaint against a lo­cal arm of the CPAM (the primary health insurance fund of France) because of comments the in­surer had made about AstraZeneca’s star cholesterol drug, CRESTOR, in a guideline for doctors published in 2006.

The CPAM had said that a 5-mil­ligram dose of rosuvastatin “does not provide any significant added benefit” compared to other medicines and recommended that doctors only prescribe it in serious cases.

According to the ruling in July 2010, the appeals court upheld two earlier decisions by courts in south­western France by dismissing the firm’s complaint against the CPAM.

According to the AFP: Laurent Jaladeau, the director of the CPAM for the southwestern Aude region that was targeted by the complaint, said CRESTOR was more expensive than other cholesterol drugs on the market.

The CPAM guide­lines, which inform doctors of the costs of reimbursing certain treatments, were based on information from the French drug safety agency.

“What’s important is that the ruling establishes that CPAM can inform doctors based on informa­tion that is scientifically founded,” Jaladeau said.

About rosuvastatin

We have listed rosuvastatin as a Do Not Use drug in our Worst Pills, Best Pills News publications since it was first approved in 2003 because of the higher rate of reports of life-threatening rhabdomyolysis (muscle destruction often accompanied by kidney damage) per million prescrip­tions compared with other cholester­ol-lowering drugs.

Because of extraordinary marketing by AstraZeneca, doctors have come to believe that the drug is more effective than other statin drugs. However, there is no evidence to suggest that it actually prevents heart attacks in people with elevated cholesterol levels — just that it slows the progression of coronary artery disease. Most other statins are allowed to explicitly state that those drugs prevent heart attacks.

The French court has confirmed our skepticism about rosuvastatin’s unique benefit in stating that the drug “does not provide any sig­nificant added benefit” compared to other medicines and recommending that doctors only prescribe it in seri­ous cases.

At least 12 million Americans cur­rently use CRESTOR. If doctors and insurers in the United States (and in other countries) followed the court’s recommendation, the use of rosuvas­tatin would be but a fraction of what it currently is.