6 ms·

Anecdote - 20+ years ago my colleague told me how his wife worked in the pharma industry. She was studying a potential product to 'cure' some disease or other.

Anecdote - 20+ years ago my colleague told me how his wife worked in the pharma industry. She was studying a potential product to 'cure' some disease or other. Apparently her initial tests on the company's product worked amazingly well, removing all trace of the disease with just a few doses. She was excited to report this success to her boss, who replied "That's Horrible!". The company wasn't interested in a cure that requires only a few doses, but something that requires a longer-term rent-seeking subscription plan.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
This seems implausible. It’s extremely difficult to find cures in the first place, and in the event a company does, the US is willing to pay a ton for them (see recent Hep C medications). I would need more proof before being able to believe an executive team would throw away a sellable cure for an extremely low probability of finding a longer term rent seeking subscription plan.
- whatshisface 5y ago
  Not all diseases are bad enough to justify enormous pricetags for a cure.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    I am not aware of any diseases where the US government would not pay for a cure if there is a known cure for it because the price to “how bad is the disease” ratio is too high.
    - lupire 5y ago
      What do you mean? The US government doesn't buy cures.
      - hyperdimension 5y ago
        It's called an orphan drug--when it's too expensive to make a profit on it, the FDA (IIRC) steps in and subsidizes it.
        lotsofpulp 5y ago
        I actually meant that Medicare/Medicaid/Tricare (aka US government) do not specifically reject treatment because of price. ACA also requires managed care organizations (aka health insurance companies) to cover pretty much all proven treatments. As an example, the new Hep C medications are $80k+ per dose or something if I recall correctly, and Medicaid pays for it.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
  - ska 5y ago
    This is certainly true, but it describes why companies don't start or continue the research. This has nothing to do with killing off a clinical stage drug because it was "too successful". The latter, as reported by GP, doesn't seem very plausible.
- Miner49er 5y ago
  I recently learned of some research that had a human trial that looked like it could potentially cure Multiple sclerosis (MS) and even potentially many (maybe all?) autoimmune diseases. However, it was too expensive, so no pharmaceutical companies picked it up. It was only when the researchers found a cheaper way of doing it that biopharmas were interested. Source is in this video, link starts at 5:35, watch until 8:15ish. https://youtu.be/J8vdDy7SN9k?t=335 https://youtu.be/J8vdDy7SN9k?t=335
minikites 5y ago
The incentives of capitalism means that the ideal goal for pharmaceutical companies is Amazon Prime, but you need to subscribe to stay alive. We need to change the incentives because this is a bad outcome for society.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  The ideal goal for everyone is getting paid (in increasing amounts) on a regular basis, regardless of “-ism”. The purpose of patents is to allow for a period to earn an ROI and then release it to everyone. Alternative could be taxpayers paying for it and it going into the public domain immediately.
  - pasquinelli 5y ago
    > The ideal goal for everyone is getting paid (in increasing amounts) on a regular basis, regardless of “-ism”. no, that parenthesis, (in increasing amounts), is a feature of capitalism, not inherent to all human motivation. the need for ever increasing income stems from the need to provide capital investors with a return.
    - lotsofpulp 5y ago
      I would wager the ideal goal of the vast majority of people would be increasing income due to wanting to consume more and more, for various reasons, but at its most basic, for the reason of attracting mates.
      - wittycardio 5y ago
        This is a complete straw man with no scientific basis at all. Desire for constantly increasing consumption could just easily be an artifact of culture. There's no reason to believe it's biological
        lotsofpulp 5y ago
        The biological part is seeking out a desirable mate (per my amateur understanding of biology - it could be completely wrong). Desirable for many animals includes ability to procure resources (and defend them). Being able to consume displays this (and not necessarily plastic things). Consuming leisure time and activities are a signal that you have the power to do more of what you want to do or obtain it. But I do not claim this is a scientific conclusion, I simply landed on this model as it seemed to match up with my reality.
sparks1970 5y ago
I work in this industry and this doesn't ring true. It would never be the case that a single researcher does some tests and reports them to the boss except in the very earliest stages of drug development. The "boss" in this situation would be another research scientist, far removed from business strategy. Even then, success in a petri-dish doesn't mean much - it would be years of research with a large team to determine if it was safe and efficacious in human trials. The idea that the pharma industry suppresses viable medicines because they are "too good" is just conspiracy theory.
- caycep 5y ago
  not to mention competition for ideas from gung ho biotech startups...
- cogman10 5y ago
  I'm not in the industry, but I've read a lot about how drugs get to market and this sounds valid. It takes a LOT of time and money for a drug company to get to the point of knowing how safe and effective a drug is in humans. That's pretty much the last step of drug manufacturing. By the time a company has spent that amount of research effort and money, there's no way they'd just abandon a drug because it isn't rent seeking enough. Businesses want to recover whatever investment they can.
  - travmatt 5y ago
    If a company is aware that a new drug could cure a previously managed disease, it’s pretty obvious that you’d like to be the one pocketing any available profits before a competitor does. The conspiracy only works to the extent that nobody else in the world could create the same drug, and that every person aware of its existence is prepared to keep it secret and lose out on the money to be made selling it.
    - cogman10 5y ago
      That too. The only way to prevent competition would be to patent the drug... and if you did that but didn't release the drug it'd be a REAL bad look. There's little reason NOT to make money on a developed drug.
dekhn 5y ago
This sounds like it went through a few rounds of telephone and lost some details. There are numerous details to this anecdote which are incompatible with the simple interpretation "pharma actively avoids cures"
read_if_gay_ 5y ago
Since we’re sharing anecdotes, a relative of mine is a retired oncologist and he’s pretty cynical towards big pharma as well. He’s witnessed patents on drugs for chemotherapy expire only for the company to introduce basically the same chemical compound with minimal changes as a new pharmaceutical, obtaining a fresh patent and of course the ability to set near arbitrary prices again. These “new” drugs could easily have worse side effects than the previous ones, too. Then they’d buy out the committees responsible for setting treatment guidelines so they’d recommend the new drugs, and to complete the puzzle, if doctors deviate from these guidelines they’re liable for potential damages. Note this is Europe and I’m not too clear on the details, but you get the gist of it.

lotsofpulp 5y ago

This seems implausible. It’s extremely difficult to find cures in the first place, and in the event a company does, the US is willing to pay a ton for them (see recent Hep C medications). I would need more proof before being able to believe an executive team would throw away a sellable cure for an extremely low probability of finding a longer term rent seeking subscription plan.

whatshisface 5y ago
Not all diseases are bad enough to justify enormous pricetags for a cure.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  I am not aware of any diseases where the US government would not pay for a cure if there is a known cure for it because the price to “how bad is the disease” ratio is too high.
  - lupire 5y ago
    What do you mean? The US government doesn't buy cures.
    - hyperdimension 5y ago
      It's called an orphan drug--when it's too expensive to make a profit on it, the FDA (IIRC) steps in and subsidizes it.
      - lotsofpulp 5y ago
        I actually meant that Medicare/Medicaid/Tricare (aka US government) do not specifically reject treatment because of price. ACA also requires managed care organizations (aka health insurance companies) to cover pretty much all proven treatments. As an example, the new Hep C medications are $80k+ per dose or something if I recall correctly, and Medicaid pays for it.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- ska 5y ago
  This is certainly true, but it describes why companies don't start or continue the research. This has nothing to do with killing off a clinical stage drug because it was "too successful". The latter, as reported by GP, doesn't seem very plausible.
Miner49er 5y ago
I recently learned of some research that had a human trial that looked like it could potentially cure Multiple sclerosis (MS) and even potentially many (maybe all?) autoimmune diseases. However, it was too expensive, so no pharmaceutical companies picked it up. It was only when the researchers found a cheaper way of doing it that biopharmas were interested. Source is in this video, link starts at 5:35, watch until 8:15ish. https://youtu.be/J8vdDy7SN9k?t=335 https://youtu.be/J8vdDy7SN9k?t=335

minikites 5y ago

The incentives of capitalism means that the ideal goal for pharmaceutical companies is Amazon Prime, but you need to subscribe to stay alive. We need to change the incentives because this is a bad outcome for society.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
The ideal goal for everyone is getting paid (in increasing amounts) on a regular basis, regardless of “-ism”. The purpose of patents is to allow for a period to earn an ROI and then release it to everyone. Alternative could be taxpayers paying for it and it going into the public domain immediately.
- pasquinelli 5y ago
  > The ideal goal for everyone is getting paid (in increasing amounts) on a regular basis, regardless of “-ism”. no, that parenthesis, (in increasing amounts), is a feature of capitalism, not inherent to all human motivation. the need for ever increasing income stems from the need to provide capital investors with a return.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    I would wager the ideal goal of the vast majority of people would be increasing income due to wanting to consume more and more, for various reasons, but at its most basic, for the reason of attracting mates.
    - wittycardio 5y ago
      This is a complete straw man with no scientific basis at all. Desire for constantly increasing consumption could just easily be an artifact of culture. There's no reason to believe it's biological
      - lotsofpulp 5y ago
        The biological part is seeking out a desirable mate (per my amateur understanding of biology - it could be completely wrong). Desirable for many animals includes ability to procure resources (and defend them). Being able to consume displays this (and not necessarily plastic things). Consuming leisure time and activities are a signal that you have the power to do more of what you want to do or obtain it. But I do not claim this is a scientific conclusion, I simply landed on this model as it seemed to match up with my reality.

sparks1970 5y ago

I work in this industry and this doesn't ring true. It would never be the case that a single researcher does some tests and reports them to the boss except in the very earliest stages of drug development. The "boss" in this situation would be another research scientist, far removed from business strategy. Even then, success in a petri-dish doesn't mean much - it would be years of research with a large team to determine if it was safe and efficacious in human trials. The idea that the pharma industry suppresses viable medicines because they are "too good" is just conspiracy theory.

caycep 5y ago
not to mention competition for ideas from gung ho biotech startups...
cogman10 5y ago
I'm not in the industry, but I've read a lot about how drugs get to market and this sounds valid. It takes a LOT of time and money for a drug company to get to the point of knowing how safe and effective a drug is in humans. That's pretty much the last step of drug manufacturing. By the time a company has spent that amount of research effort and money, there's no way they'd just abandon a drug because it isn't rent seeking enough. Businesses want to recover whatever investment they can.
- travmatt 5y ago
  If a company is aware that a new drug could cure a previously managed disease, it’s pretty obvious that you’d like to be the one pocketing any available profits before a competitor does. The conspiracy only works to the extent that nobody else in the world could create the same drug, and that every person aware of its existence is prepared to keep it secret and lose out on the money to be made selling it.
  - cogman10 5y ago
    That too. The only way to prevent competition would be to patent the drug... and if you did that but didn't release the drug it'd be a REAL bad look. There's little reason NOT to make money on a developed drug.

dekhn 5y ago

This sounds like it went through a few rounds of telephone and lost some details. There are numerous details to this anecdote which are incompatible with the simple interpretation "pharma actively avoids cures"

read_if_gay_ 5y ago

Since we’re sharing anecdotes, a relative of mine is a retired oncologist and he’s pretty cynical towards big pharma as well. He’s witnessed patents on drugs for chemotherapy expire only for the company to introduce basically the same chemical compound with minimal changes as a new pharmaceutical, obtaining a fresh patent and of course the ability to set near arbitrary prices again. These “new” drugs could easily have worse side effects than the previous ones, too. Then they’d buy out the committees responsible for setting treatment guidelines so they’d recommend the new drugs, and to complete the puzzle, if doctors deviate from these guidelines they’re liable for potential damages. Note this is Europe and I’m not too clear on the details, but you get the gist of it.