3 ms·
The point is not the level of effort that it takes to create the drug, the problem is they are allocating resources to research drugs to treat already-served ai
by skohan 7y ago
The point is not the level of effort that it takes to create the drug, the problem is they are allocating resources to research drugs to treat already-served ailments due to the profit motive rather than trying to find solutions for conditions which are not yet adequately treated.
- refurb 7y agoWhat does adequately treated mean? It may come as a surprise, but most pharmaceutical advances come as incremental changes. I can't find it, but there was an interesting chart showing life expectancy of colon cancer over time. Each of the new advances only added 2-3 months of life. However, after a decade, life expectancy had grown by almost 5 years. So my comment for you is that they wouldn't be putting R&D money into something unless there was enough demand for it.
- skohan 7y agoSo for instance, take a look at this study on the cost/benefit evaluation of patent extensions in the pharma industry: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3672218/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3672218/ What they found is that the strategies used by drug companies to "evergreen" their patented drugs resulted in massive unnecessary expenditures with negligible differences in outcomes.
- refurb 7y agoYeah, but that article suggests the problem lies with the hospital, not the drug company. The hospital is choosing to use these marginally better drugs over the cheaper generics. And I take issue with their claim that pregabalin is an evergreen strategy for gabapentin. Those are two very different drugs.