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Perhaps the right policy to serve the public interest is for Uncle Sam to pay the patent owner $1B for each of the remaining years on its insulin patent and the

Perhaps the right policy to serve the public interest is for Uncle Sam to pay the patent owner $1B for each of the remaining years on its insulin patent and then 'genericize' today's insulins. The shareholders would earn their profits while the public would be served by gaining immediate access to superior diabetes treatment for a trivial cost of perhaps $20B -- a pittance when compared to the current scenario where millions of diabetics worldwide continue to suffer because unthinking pols continue to publicly kowtow shamelessly before the altar of Capitalism.

dogma1138 12y ago
How about getting universal healthcare with a single payer system (at least state wise) so instead of having a billion smaller organizations with a more limited buying power that can't get you the best prices? You know why in the UK drugs cost 20-25% on average of the US price, not because of subsidies but because the NHS provides healthcare for 60M people and they say we are paying X for the drug now bid. Your local HMO not to mention an IPA simply can't do that. But anyhow as people have stated Insulin even the "older" versions is insanely expensive to fabricate and purify, it's simply not something that a generic company will go after. Most generic companies go for medicine which is easy to produce and is compatible with their existing fabrication capabilities.
- refurb 12y ago
  You know why in the UK drugs cost 20-25% on average of the US price, not because of subsidies but because the NHS provides healthcare for 60M people and they say we are paying X for the drug now bid. That's not why drugs are cheaper in the UK. The largest US health insurance company is United and it covers almost 40M people. More than in all of Canada. Yet United pays more for drugs than Canada. Also, drugs in the UK don't cost 20-25% of the US price. Maybe you meant 75-80%?

dogma1138 12y ago

How about getting universal healthcare with a single payer system (at least state wise) so instead of having a billion smaller organizations with a more limited buying power that can't get you the best prices? You know why in the UK drugs cost 20-25% on average of the US price, not because of subsidies but because the NHS provides healthcare for 60M people and they say we are paying X for the drug now bid. Your local HMO not to mention an IPA simply can't do that. But anyhow as people have stated Insulin even the "older" versions is insanely expensive to fabricate and purify, it's simply not something that a generic company will go after. Most generic companies go for medicine which is easy to produce and is compatible with their existing fabrication capabilities.

refurb 12y ago
You know why in the UK drugs cost 20-25% on average of the US price, not because of subsidies but because the NHS provides healthcare for 60M people and they say we are paying X for the drug now bid. That's not why drugs are cheaper in the UK. The largest US health insurance company is United and it covers almost 40M people. More than in all of Canada. Yet United pays more for drugs than Canada. Also, drugs in the UK don't cost 20-25% of the US price. Maybe you meant 75-80%?