7 ms·

All aside from the healthy criticism on the clickbait title, I found the approach to make it royalty-free (presumably for generic production) and free of cost a

All aside from the healthy criticism on the clickbait title, I found the approach to make it royalty-free (presumably for generic production) and free of cost access to uninsured individuals incredibly fascinating. How will they manage to cover R&D costs? That’s the primary reason pharmaceutical companies use to justify exorbitant drug prices. Was this a result of a philanthropic endeavor?

42772827 1y ago
They bill the insurance companies a lot, plus they take public and private (i.e., government and Gates Foundation) investment.
- erikig 1y ago
  A quick online search revealed that the HIV prevention drug Yeztugo (lenacapavir), is priced at $28,218 per year in the US. This translates to $14,109 per injection, as it is administered twice a year. I wonder what this will look like worldwide, especially in countries where this is needed the most, once production ramps up.
  - spjt 1y ago
    Would be nice if I could just directly get paid $28K/year to not have sex.
  - dfadsadsf 1y ago
    In practical terms it means public subsidizing gay lifestyle in US by 28k/year - it’s the only demographic outside of sex workers for whom this drug make sense and will be routinely offered. It’s just not sustainable.
pavlov 1y ago
Here’s a detailed account of the development spanning over thirty years: https://www.aaas.org/news/road-lenacapavir-breakthrough-hiv-treatment https://www.aaas.org/news/road-lenacapavir-breakthrough-hiv-... Seems to be a combination of university funding (University of Utah), big pharma (Gilead), and global HIV advocacy groups working together. Sadly this kind of university research and non-profit advocacy groups are both prime targets of the Trump administration’s funding cuts. The next breakthrough drugs may have to be developed in some other country.
philipkglass 1y ago
It was developed by Gilead Sciences, Inc. The way they can afford to make it cheap for people who can't pay is by charging high prices for insured Americans. You can see this with their earlier developed treatment for hepatitis C: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilead_Sciences#Pricing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilead_Sciences#Pricing Gilead came under intense criticism for its high pricing of its patented drug sofosbuvir (sold under the brand name Sovaldi), used to treat hepatitis C. In the US, for instance, it was launched at $1,000 per pill or $84,000 for the standard 84-day course, but it was drastically cheaper in the developing world; in India, it dropped as low as $4.29 per pill. Low priced HIV drugs for the poor is part PR and part pragmatism. Poor people can't pay the sorts of drug prices that insured Americans do, and poor countries aren't going to enforce drug patents purely for the benefit of American corporations, e.g.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicines_and_Related_Substances_Control_Amendment_Act,_1997 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicines_and_Related_Substanc... Gilead looks gracious by preemptively embracing the situation that was going to occur anyway (poor patients aren't going to pay high prices).
- tossandthrow 1y ago
  Privatized progressive tax? IMHO this is great - broadest shoulders shoulder most. However, it likely should be more organized? Maybe do more of this research in public institutions and make it freely available to commercialize.
  - nwienert 1y ago
    It's been like this, Americans heavily subsidize the world in healthcare/research. Which becomes annoying when fairly rich Europeans ride these coattails (and defense) while being incessantly snobbish about their healthcare superiority, in large part paid for by us. Though a big part of the Trump win comes from this - yea some Americans are rich, but a lot of them are really poor and justly mad at how much more expensive things are that we produce.
    - watwut 1y ago
      [flagged]
os2warpman 1y ago
>How will they manage to cover R&D costs? Seeing that pharmaceutical companies, on average, spend much more on marketing than R&D I would eliminate marketing. Most of the rest of the world has banned drug advertisements, and sales reps whose activities more resemble bribery than anything else, and they're doing fine. Don't even eliminate it. Just halve it. The typical drug "researcher" spends $2 on commercials and sports sponsorships for every $1 spent on R&D. In addition to marketing, pharmaceutical companies spend, again on average, MUCH MUCH WAAAAAAAAY more on stock buybacks and dividends than they do R&D. Between $2 and $4 for every $1 spent on R&D. That could also be a source of, oh who the hell am I kidding... Modern drugmakers aren't biotechnology companies, they are financial instruments that just so happen, by coincidence, to employ chemists.
- bee_rider 1y ago
  It would be kind of interesting to require companies to limit marketing budgets to half of R&D, or whatever. The obvious objection is that this will result in inflated research budgets and maybe marketing-adjacent research (like benchmarking). But actually, more benchmarking could be good. Or maybe they’ll inflate their research budgets by dropping money into basic research.
  - nineplay 1y ago
    To what end? Companies spend $X on marketing to make $X + $Y. If you force them to reduce $X than assuming they don't come up with creative financial workarounds, you've just made them make less money. What has this accomplished for the betterment of anyone?
    - Marsymars 1y ago
      > To what end? Companies spend $X on marketing to make $X + $Y. I expect that in many cases this is only true because the advertising market is competitive - you can’t advertise less, or you’ll lose market share to your competitors. But if everyone is prohibited from advertising cars, is the total market for cars really going to shrink? And if it does, is that actually a net negative for society?

42772827 1y ago

They bill the insurance companies a lot, plus they take public and private (i.e., government and Gates Foundation) investment.

erikig 1y ago
A quick online search revealed that the HIV prevention drug Yeztugo (lenacapavir), is priced at $28,218 per year in the US. This translates to $14,109 per injection, as it is administered twice a year. I wonder what this will look like worldwide, especially in countries where this is needed the most, once production ramps up.
- spjt 1y ago
  Would be nice if I could just directly get paid $28K/year to not have sex.
- dfadsadsf 1y ago
  In practical terms it means public subsidizing gay lifestyle in US by 28k/year - it’s the only demographic outside of sex workers for whom this drug make sense and will be routinely offered. It’s just not sustainable.

pavlov 1y ago

Here’s a detailed account of the development spanning over thirty years: https://www.aaas.org/news/road-lenacapavir-breakthrough-hiv-treatment https://www.aaas.org/news/road-lenacapavir-breakthrough-hiv-... Seems to be a combination of university funding (University of Utah), big pharma (Gilead), and global HIV advocacy groups working together. Sadly this kind of university research and non-profit advocacy groups are both prime targets of the Trump administration’s funding cuts. The next breakthrough drugs may have to be developed in some other country.

philipkglass 1y ago

It was developed by Gilead Sciences, Inc. The way they can afford to make it cheap for people who can't pay is by charging high prices for insured Americans. You can see this with their earlier developed treatment for hepatitis C: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilead_Sciences#Pricing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilead_Sciences#Pricing Gilead came under intense criticism for its high pricing of its patented drug sofosbuvir (sold under the brand name Sovaldi), used to treat hepatitis C. In the US, for instance, it was launched at $1,000 per pill or $84,000 for the standard 84-day course, but it was drastically cheaper in the developing world; in India, it dropped as low as $4.29 per pill. Low priced HIV drugs for the poor is part PR and part pragmatism. Poor people can't pay the sorts of drug prices that insured Americans do, and poor countries aren't going to enforce drug patents purely for the benefit of American corporations, e.g.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicines_and_Related_Substances_Control_Amendment_Act,_1997 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicines_and_Related_Substanc... Gilead looks gracious by preemptively embracing the situation that was going to occur anyway (poor patients aren't going to pay high prices).

tossandthrow 1y ago
Privatized progressive tax? IMHO this is great - broadest shoulders shoulder most. However, it likely should be more organized? Maybe do more of this research in public institutions and make it freely available to commercialize.
- nwienert 1y ago
  It's been like this, Americans heavily subsidize the world in healthcare/research. Which becomes annoying when fairly rich Europeans ride these coattails (and defense) while being incessantly snobbish about their healthcare superiority, in large part paid for by us. Though a big part of the Trump win comes from this - yea some Americans are rich, but a lot of them are really poor and justly mad at how much more expensive things are that we produce.
  - watwut 1y ago
    [flagged]

os2warpman 1y ago

>How will they manage to cover R&D costs? Seeing that pharmaceutical companies, on average, spend much more on marketing than R&D I would eliminate marketing. Most of the rest of the world has banned drug advertisements, and sales reps whose activities more resemble bribery than anything else, and they're doing fine. Don't even eliminate it. Just halve it. The typical drug "researcher" spends $2 on commercials and sports sponsorships for every $1 spent on R&D. In addition to marketing, pharmaceutical companies spend, again on average, MUCH MUCH WAAAAAAAAY more on stock buybacks and dividends than they do R&D. Between $2 and $4 for every $1 spent on R&D. That could also be a source of, oh who the hell am I kidding... Modern drugmakers aren't biotechnology companies, they are financial instruments that just so happen, by coincidence, to employ chemists.

bee_rider 1y ago
It would be kind of interesting to require companies to limit marketing budgets to half of R&D, or whatever. The obvious objection is that this will result in inflated research budgets and maybe marketing-adjacent research (like benchmarking). But actually, more benchmarking could be good. Or maybe they’ll inflate their research budgets by dropping money into basic research.
- nineplay 1y ago
  To what end? Companies spend $X on marketing to make $X + $Y. If you force them to reduce $X than assuming they don't come up with creative financial workarounds, you've just made them make less money. What has this accomplished for the betterment of anyone?
  - Marsymars 1y ago
    > To what end? Companies spend $X on marketing to make $X + $Y. I expect that in many cases this is only true because the advertising market is competitive - you can’t advertise less, or you’ll lose market share to your competitors. But if everyone is prohibited from advertising cars, is the total market for cars really going to shrink? And if it does, is that actually a net negative for society?