I'm not a huge fan of patents for many cases, but drug patents are something I support. Don't forget that while someone might die today from not having the drug

I'm not a huge fan of patents for many cases, but drug patents are something I support. Don't forget that while someone might die today from not having the drug, more people may die in the future because it's not worthwhile for a company to invent new drugs without patent protection. We can debate what is fair patent protection for drugs, but protection is essential. It's easy to see a drug that exists and ignore all that went into making it, and also easy to ignore the drugs that will never be invented because they're not worthwhile to make. It's also deadly. http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2005/10/if_france_gets_its_way_38_mill.html http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2005/10/if_france_gets_its_wa... And getting mad at Novartis in this case for "evergreening" also isn't entirely fair, because up until 2003/5 India was the wild west when it came to drugs, and thus Novartis couldn't really sell it there anyway. If India had product patents when Gleevec was invented in 1995, maybe they would be on course to have the generic soon. Instead, the rest of the world is subsidizing cheap drugs for India. We invent, we pay, they benefit.