6 ms·

Drugs do not operate in a market. It is definitely not true with patented drugs (which operate under a government monopoly), and as we're seeing now that monopo

Drugs do not operate in a market. It is definitely not true with patented drugs (which operate under a government monopoly), and as we're seeing now that monopolies are taking over generics that's becoming less true there as well. In addition, it's simply false that businesses are more efficient than the government. For example, compare overhead in public health care systems (e.g. Medicare) to private insurance systems and you'll find that the overhead is vastly lower in the public systems - something like 3% vs. 15%. Giant businesses are as burdened by bureaucracy as any other large institution, and they're only as efficient as they need to be, which in an industry with monopoly rents is not very efficient (pharma spends as much on research as the government for much less in research outcomes). Government at least has Republicans keeping it trim.

darkmighty 11y ago
They do not operate in a market, but there are market-driven pressures for developing new drugs: efficient companies assign research priority according to their expected returns from drug development. In any case, reform is definitively needed; and complaining without demanding reform is pointless. Discovering new drugs is a scientific endeavor and so it really should be as open as possible. I am a little skeptical of plain massive government research agencies, but maybe it's a good way to go. Maybe patent reform or something else is instead better. If you look at machine learning research the industry is not bad at sharing results because of two factors, apparently: 1) Companies know that progress will be much faster if everyone decides to share 2) To attract to researchers, they need to show they do high caliber research and share.