24 ms·

No opinion on this exact story, but in general there's a bit of a balance to be struck here. Early on in this thing, there were lots of stories about companies

by iguy 7y ago

No opinion on this exact story, but in general there's a bit of a balance to be struck here. Early on in this thing, there were lots of stories about companies reluctant to fully commit (e.g. to manufacturing masks, or to dropping everything else to work on a vaccine) because they did that for SARS, and then when it fizzled out felt they weren't sufficiently compensated. Had they worked on their usual business, they would have had their usual profits instead. But this year... it would have been nice if they had worked hard in February!

tomohawk 7y ago
Yes, they learned that lesson, and now we are paying for the short sightedness of the politicians at that time hanging them out to dry. The signal for a company to work hard is to award them a contract. If it's important enough to get done, then it's important enough for whatever government to put a contract in place and get the work going. When those in power require work to be done for free, it is called slavery, not volunteering.
- ClumsyPilot 7y ago
  Right now, fast response and supplies are needed, and every hour of delay is someone dead. Obstructionism will not be tolerated by the public, and you won't sway anyone with discourse on slavery or evils of socialism. Yes, foresight would be great, but that ship has sailed.
  - tomohawk 7y ago
    > every hour of delay So, the government should hurry up and make a deal.
xiphias2 7y ago
Sure, I agree with the balancing act. There just shouldn't be any monetary problem going on, as testing is so cheap compared to the effects of not putting sick people on quarantine. I'm just fustrated of the whole western thinking while Asia shows us that fighting the virus is just a logistical problem, we have all the needed technology (masks, testing, quarantine, hygiene, temperature checking everywhere).
- iguy 7y ago
  Frustrated too, but it's not just a logistical problem, it's a political problem. We have lots of logistical wizards but had to decide to employ them them. Lots of bio-lab wizards too.
m0zg 7y ago
Why "early on"? Just yesterday GM tried to price-gouge the US federal government, and restrict the number of ventilators they will produce, prompting Trump to actually use the DPA for the first time in this ordeal, something he's very reluctant to do other than as leverage in negotiations.
- CamperBob2 7y ago
  But I thought Trump said there wasn't a ventilator shortage, or something along those lines. Didn't he accuse New York of asking for more than they needed? Now, all of a sudden, ventilators are very important to Trump. Odd.
  - xiphias2 7y ago
    He doesn't understand exponential function, neither most of the people in the world. It's counterintuitive, as the brain is heavily biased to linear thinking. Also in western world generally math is not cool, people have a strong bias against it.
  - m0zg 7y ago
    There isn't a shortage, yet. Cuomo was put on the spot today over thousands of ventilators sitting in a warehouse. He said they don't need them yet, but they "expect to" in the future. Any claims of a current shortage, therefore, are a lie.
- iguy 7y ago
  I said early on because in Jan/Feb some people thought it might blow over -- it wasn't 100% obvious that you would be able to sell every mask you could make. Had someone signed a contract for 6 months of full production, they would have switched, but without it, they sat. That was a situation with a lot of parallels to SARS. Now of course things are different, nobody is thinking the way I suggested. They are playing other games, though.
zwaps 7y ago
Well here the issue is that Roche has been compensated as the orders are in. Roche just does not seek to fulfill them in a timely manner. Which is also a strategic decision of production and inventory. Given that any production ramp up would have been a risky decision in January, the point explicitly is not that Roche can not supply the material right this instance. What's not okay is that Roche uses vendor locking in or legal lock ins (Denmark) to keep countries from running any tests. This is not a matter of ramping up production in January ex-ante. It's a thing that happened and was discussed just last week, when many EU countries literally were in a state of emergency since more than a week. In an effort to protect future, not current, profits, Roche has more or less directly contributed to the death of people. And if you think this is a strategic decisions that firms should be able to make in such a volatile situation, then you should probably not be allowed to gain these kinds of market shares in the EU. Because let's be clear. If there were a legal institution to solve this problem last week or two weeks ago, it would have been used. The only reason Roche responds now is because the EC would invoke its discretionary power, slow as it is. The only ethical decision for Roche would have been to release either the recipe or release legal lock-ins as soon as it was apparent that they could not fulfill orders in time. Roche, which is not a EU company, should be held accountable to whatever degree the law allows. And to the degree it doesn't, such laws should be created. From a EU perspective, it is doubtful whether a company that acts in this way should be allowed to do business here in this manner - in my personal opinion. And that's not just empty talk - in several countries the constitutions actually do norm that lives and welfare of people take precedence over pecuniary interests. For example, Roche would have simply have been disowned of their intellectual property by a court here in Germany if we would have had the same lock-in issue. There's ample legal precedent for that, and there are high legal boundaries for such actions. But given the setup of our constitution, these requirements are clearly met in this case.
- _trampeltier 7y ago
  Of course we have a special time at moment and I understand your point. But on the other hand, Roche is a just a company and companys exist to make money. I couldn't find it, but back in january there was a press release from several pharma companys who said, they will not start to work on Covid-19 because the last time with Sars etc. finally nobody paid them.

by iguy 7y ago

tomohawk 7y ago

Yes, they learned that lesson, and now we are paying for the short sightedness of the politicians at that time hanging them out to dry. The signal for a company to work hard is to award them a contract. If it's important enough to get done, then it's important enough for whatever government to put a contract in place and get the work going. When those in power require work to be done for free, it is called slavery, not volunteering.

ClumsyPilot 7y ago
Right now, fast response and supplies are needed, and every hour of delay is someone dead. Obstructionism will not be tolerated by the public, and you won't sway anyone with discourse on slavery or evils of socialism. Yes, foresight would be great, but that ship has sailed.
- tomohawk 7y ago
  > every hour of delay So, the government should hurry up and make a deal.

xiphias2 7y ago

Sure, I agree with the balancing act. There just shouldn't be any monetary problem going on, as testing is so cheap compared to the effects of not putting sick people on quarantine. I'm just fustrated of the whole western thinking while Asia shows us that fighting the virus is just a logistical problem, we have all the needed technology (masks, testing, quarantine, hygiene, temperature checking everywhere).

iguy 7y ago
Frustrated too, but it's not just a logistical problem, it's a political problem. We have lots of logistical wizards but had to decide to employ them them. Lots of bio-lab wizards too.

m0zg 7y ago

Why "early on"? Just yesterday GM tried to price-gouge the US federal government, and restrict the number of ventilators they will produce, prompting Trump to actually use the DPA for the first time in this ordeal, something he's very reluctant to do other than as leverage in negotiations.

CamperBob2 7y ago
But I thought Trump said there wasn't a ventilator shortage, or something along those lines. Didn't he accuse New York of asking for more than they needed? Now, all of a sudden, ventilators are very important to Trump. Odd.
- xiphias2 7y ago
  He doesn't understand exponential function, neither most of the people in the world. It's counterintuitive, as the brain is heavily biased to linear thinking. Also in western world generally math is not cool, people have a strong bias against it.
- m0zg 7y ago
  There isn't a shortage, yet. Cuomo was put on the spot today over thousands of ventilators sitting in a warehouse. He said they don't need them yet, but they "expect to" in the future. Any claims of a current shortage, therefore, are a lie.
iguy 7y ago
I said early on because in Jan/Feb some people thought it might blow over -- it wasn't 100% obvious that you would be able to sell every mask you could make. Had someone signed a contract for 6 months of full production, they would have switched, but without it, they sat. That was a situation with a lot of parallels to SARS. Now of course things are different, nobody is thinking the way I suggested. They are playing other games, though.

zwaps 7y ago

Well here the issue is that Roche has been compensated as the orders are in. Roche just does not seek to fulfill them in a timely manner. Which is also a strategic decision of production and inventory. Given that any production ramp up would have been a risky decision in January, the point explicitly is not that Roche can not supply the material right this instance. What's not okay is that Roche uses vendor locking in or legal lock ins (Denmark) to keep countries from running any tests. This is not a matter of ramping up production in January ex-ante. It's a thing that happened and was discussed just last week, when many EU countries literally were in a state of emergency since more than a week. In an effort to protect future, not current, profits, Roche has more or less directly contributed to the death of people. And if you think this is a strategic decisions that firms should be able to make in such a volatile situation, then you should probably not be allowed to gain these kinds of market shares in the EU. Because let's be clear. If there were a legal institution to solve this problem last week or two weeks ago, it would have been used. The only reason Roche responds now is because the EC would invoke its discretionary power, slow as it is. The only ethical decision for Roche would have been to release either the recipe or release legal lock-ins as soon as it was apparent that they could not fulfill orders in time. Roche, which is not a EU company, should be held accountable to whatever degree the law allows. And to the degree it doesn't, such laws should be created. From a EU perspective, it is doubtful whether a company that acts in this way should be allowed to do business here in this manner - in my personal opinion. And that's not just empty talk - in several countries the constitutions actually do norm that lives and welfare of people take precedence over pecuniary interests. For example, Roche would have simply have been disowned of their intellectual property by a court here in Germany if we would have had the same lock-in issue. There's ample legal precedent for that, and there are high legal boundaries for such actions. But given the setup of our constitution, these requirements are clearly met in this case.

_trampeltier 7y ago
Of course we have a special time at moment and I understand your point. But on the other hand, Roche is a just a company and companys exist to make money. I couldn't find it, but back in january there was a press release from several pharma companys who said, they will not start to work on Covid-19 because the last time with Sars etc. finally nobody paid them.