4 ms·

People are better served by having a wider choice No, the consensus in medial ethics is that patient outcomes are the only thing that's relevant. "Choice" is a

People are better served by having a wider choice No, the consensus in medial ethics is that patient outcomes are the only thing that's relevant. "Choice" is an important symbol in American Civil Religion, but it's not relevant, we are talking medical ethics here.

mc32 8y ago
My bad, by choice I meant a wider array of drugs whereby this larger array implies better matches of drugs to treat illnesses more effectively. Let’s say drugX works well enough on 85% of patients and drugY works well enough on 5% of patients. It’s better to have both drugs available than just the one that treats the majority of patients.
- frgtpsswrdlame 8y ago
  I don't think it's so clear cut. First of all with these drugs it's actually impossible to say what percentage of patients our new drugY will work on or who they are. Instead they're going to be marketed to everyone. In fact the article makes the case that these faster approvals may actually slow down our ability to get this information: The FDA also increasingly allows drugmakers to claim success in trials based on proxy measurements — such as shrunken tumors — instead of clinical outcomes like survival rates or cures, which take more time to evaluate. In return for accelerated approval, drug companies commit to researching how well their drugs work after going on the market. But these post-marketing studies can take 10 years or longer to complete, leaving patients and doctors with lingering questions about safety and benefit. So what, there's going to be a 10 year period where patients are unable to evaluate what their best shot at treatment is? We often forget that markets and rational decision-making require good information to produce good outcomes. Allowing drugs into the market that are opaque and expensive isn't going to make things better for patients, it's going to make it worse.
  - XalvinX 8y ago
    I didn't read the article (yet) but this quote "drug companies commit to researching how well their drugs work after going on the market" means (correct me if I'm wrong here) that drug companies get to use the market as guinea pigs ? Do you take it to mean that? Others? I mean, there is no way that can be true, is there? The FDA is allowing private, for-profit companies (many with an already checkered past) to utilize citizens as their motherfucking lab rats? Ummmmmmmm.....no way. Don't we (the people, right?) get to vote on this or something? This doesn't seem very just.
    - XalvinX 8y ago
      downvoted? to those that did, have a nice death. and your family too.
      - dang 8y ago
        I can understand why you'd feel so strongly about this, but that doesn't make it ok to post flamewar rants to Hacker News. Posting like this in particular will get you banned here. If you'd please (re-)read the site guidelines and post civilly and substantively only from now on, we'd appreciate it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
        XalvinX 8y ago
        Thanks for the friendly warning. I will try to be more civil. Still, I'm surprised that it would be okay for one poster to actively promote dangerous drugs and defend big pharma and their psychiatrist puppets in an equally emotionally tone.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

mc32 8y ago

My bad, by choice I meant a wider array of drugs whereby this larger array implies better matches of drugs to treat illnesses more effectively. Let’s say drugX works well enough on 85% of patients and drugY works well enough on 5% of patients. It’s better to have both drugs available than just the one that treats the majority of patients.

frgtpsswrdlame 8y ago
I don't think it's so clear cut. First of all with these drugs it's actually impossible to say what percentage of patients our new drugY will work on or who they are. Instead they're going to be marketed to everyone. In fact the article makes the case that these faster approvals may actually slow down our ability to get this information: The FDA also increasingly allows drugmakers to claim success in trials based on proxy measurements — such as shrunken tumors — instead of clinical outcomes like survival rates or cures, which take more time to evaluate. In return for accelerated approval, drug companies commit to researching how well their drugs work after going on the market. But these post-marketing studies can take 10 years or longer to complete, leaving patients and doctors with lingering questions about safety and benefit. So what, there's going to be a 10 year period where patients are unable to evaluate what their best shot at treatment is? We often forget that markets and rational decision-making require good information to produce good outcomes. Allowing drugs into the market that are opaque and expensive isn't going to make things better for patients, it's going to make it worse.
- XalvinX 8y ago
  I didn't read the article (yet) but this quote "drug companies commit to researching how well their drugs work after going on the market" means (correct me if I'm wrong here) that drug companies get to use the market as guinea pigs ? Do you take it to mean that? Others? I mean, there is no way that can be true, is there? The FDA is allowing private, for-profit companies (many with an already checkered past) to utilize citizens as their motherfucking lab rats? Ummmmmmmm.....no way. Don't we (the people, right?) get to vote on this or something? This doesn't seem very just.
  - XalvinX 8y ago
    downvoted? to those that did, have a nice death. and your family too.
    - dang 8y ago
      I can understand why you'd feel so strongly about this, but that doesn't make it ok to post flamewar rants to Hacker News. Posting like this in particular will get you banned here. If you'd please (re-)read the site guidelines and post civilly and substantively only from now on, we'd appreciate it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - XalvinX 8y ago
        Thanks for the friendly warning. I will try to be more civil. Still, I'm surprised that it would be okay for one poster to actively promote dangerous drugs and defend big pharma and their psychiatrist puppets in an equally emotionally tone.
deleted 8y ago
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