A federal appeals court on Thursday refused to revive Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd’s patent infringement suit against AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals LP for the rights to Crestor, a multibillion-dollar cholesterol fighter. In a ruling that upheld a lower court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit invalidated Teva’s patent for Crestor on grounds that AstraZenec invented it first. Teva in 1999 patented a method for stabilizing drugs known as statins, which help lower cholesterol. Statins are inherently unstable and require an added compound to be medically effective.
