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If you've had type 2 diabetes for more than 30 years, you may well be on insulin by now. Also, blaming big pharma for making people pay for insulin makes no sen

by ksenzee 11y ago

If you've had type 2 diabetes for more than 30 years, you may well be on insulin by now. Also, blaming big pharma for making people pay for insulin makes no sense. You can argue that they're charging too much, certainly, or that government should step in to pay for it. But arguing that they shouldn't make a profit? That's like blaming farmers for making a profit from farming. We all need food to live, but it's not their job to give me free food.

zwetan 11y ago
did you read the article about the patent and how insulin been discovered ? here some quotes "Insulin's Canadian discoverers sold the patent to their university for $1, stating that profit was not their goal." "Discoverers Didn't Intend Insulin to Become a Profitable Monopoly" so yeah I blame big pharma they took over a cheap patent, made some modification and abused the patent system on a non-curable illness that affect more and more people and when the profit is not enough, they raise the price what's your arguments again ? that they are entitled to makea profit ? when they did not discovered or produced the original patent ? are you saying that seriously ?
- true_religion 11y ago
  Is the currently produced insulin by 'big pharma' as you term them, significantly different from the original formulation? If it is, then it cannot be termed abuse of the patent system. If it is not, then our current situation can be termed a side-effect of a broken patent system. Yet all that is orthogonal to the above poster. Even if pharmaceutical companies were only using the original formulation, they would still be entitled to make a profit under any capitalist mode of thought. Simply because something is required for life is no barrier to morally or economically, for allowing someone to profit from it. Granted, anything that is required for life will be tightly regulated by the government. For instance, I'd think its impossible for farmers to collude to withhold their produce and simply starve a country.

by ksenzee 11y ago

zwetan 11y ago

did you read the article about the patent and how insulin been discovered ? here some quotes "Insulin's Canadian discoverers sold the patent to their university for $1, stating that profit was not their goal." "Discoverers Didn't Intend Insulin to Become a Profitable Monopoly" so yeah I blame big pharma they took over a cheap patent, made some modification and abused the patent system on a non-curable illness that affect more and more people and when the profit is not enough, they raise the price what's your arguments again ? that they are entitled to makea profit ? when they did not discovered or produced the original patent ? are you saying that seriously ?

true_religion 11y ago
Is the currently produced insulin by 'big pharma' as you term them, significantly different from the original formulation? If it is, then it cannot be termed abuse of the patent system. If it is not, then our current situation can be termed a side-effect of a broken patent system. Yet all that is orthogonal to the above poster. Even if pharmaceutical companies were only using the original formulation, they would still be entitled to make a profit under any capitalist mode of thought. Simply because something is required for life is no barrier to morally or economically, for allowing someone to profit from it. Granted, anything that is required for life will be tightly regulated by the government. For instance, I'd think its impossible for farmers to collude to withhold their produce and simply starve a country.