A federal judge in California has dismissed an antitrust suit filed by radiopharmacy PharmaRx Pharmaceutical against GE Healthcare and Cardinal Health, alleging the companies have a monopoly on sales of GE's Myoview cardiac imaging agent.
Judge Mariana Pfaelzer of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that PharmaRx did not offer enough evidence to support its claim. The judge dismissed the case without prejudice, however, which allows PharmaRx to file a follow-up complaint.
In an amended complaint filed on May 31 in the court's Western Division, PharmaRx alleged that it and other nuclear pharmacies had been denied the right to purchase Myoview in certain sales territories and/or denied the right to purchase other products from GE, as a result of its tying those products to purchases of Myoview.
PharmaRx sought to have Myoview be available to the company and other firms and asked the court to award damages based on the defendants' alleged "conspiracy to eliminate competition in the market for nuclear cardiac imaging agents in violation of federal antitrust law."
GE and Cardinal each filed motions on June 22 to dismiss the complaint.
In 2008, GE and Cardinal signed an agreement granting Cardinal the right to purchase Myoview for all of its radiopharmacies in the U.S. Collectively, the companies own and operate nearly 200 radiopharmacies throughout the U.S., according to the complaint.
