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Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

nytimes.com

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Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#51

Post by antr »

pessimizer wrote: post #39
antr wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want my goverment helping people avoid health issues, rather than subsidising costs that could have been prevented. I've yet to see any one industry that has been nationalised and is performing better (in every sense) than the private sector.

Virtually all national health care systems perform better (in every sense) than the American private sector one.

I agree, a healthcare system, the question is at what cost per patient/treatment. The healthcare system, is a system, not an industry per se. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for public healthcare... but the comment feels like a knee jerk reaction.

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#52

Post by assface »

antr wrote: post #26
JulianMorrison wrote: post #9

Drug creation needs to be nationalized, 100% tax funded all the way from researcher to trials to manufacture, and the drugs sold at cost thereafter. And the pharmaceuticals industry needs to just go away.

I want my goverment helping people avoid health issues, rather than subsidising costs that could have been prevented. I've yet to see any one industry that has been nationalised and is performing better (in every sense) than the private sector.

> I've yet to see any one industry that has been nationalised as is performing better (in every sense) than the private sector.

The nationalized health care programs seem to be performing better in other countries than ours.

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#54

Post by deskamess »

misnome wrote: post #35

I was under the impression that this was entirely the purpose of generic versions? At least in the UK (yes, I know we are relatively spoiled by the NHS), almost every popular drug has a generic version easily accessible. If I'm reading this right, the UK NHS price for BRANDED Daraprim is £13/30 tablets: https://www.evidence.nhs.uk/formulary/bnf/current/5-infectio... and the purpose is listed as primarily an antimalar…

Used Daraprim in the 80's when in Southern Africa. It was a mainstay and, as far as I can recall, not expensive then either. I find this whole procedure revolting; no innovation either.

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#55

Post by bedhead »

I am a fund manager and I have followed Martin Shkreli since his prior company, Retrophin, went public about two years ago. Simply put, Martin is a sociopathic criminal with a well-established, and consistent track record of deceit, recklessness, failure, and just plain old stupidity. But he is also hyper-aggressive. He is currently living in Switzerland, and it's my understanding that he fled the country in order to avoid prosecution and asset forfeiture.

Anyway, Martin is running the same playbook at Turing that he did at Retrophin, which is to find some old orphan drug and raise the price by orders of magnitude. It's believed insurers won't have a choice but to pay since there are no competitors. If you want to see how this has worked out in the past, feel free to google "KV Pharmaceuticals Makena" which did something similar a few years ago, only to have it bankrupt the company (which would be an outcome completely consistent with Martin's history and tactics).

For a fun read, check out the lawsuit filed against him by Retrophin. In all my years of investing, he is one of the most unique scumbags I've ever come across.

http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1438533/0001193125152...

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#56

Post by refurb »

pessimizer wrote: post #39
antr wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want my goverment helping people avoid health issues, rather than subsidising costs that could have been prevented. I've yet to see any one industry that has been nationalised and is performing better (in every sense) than the private sector.

Virtually all national health care systems perform better (in every sense) than the American private sector one.

That's definitely untrue. Check out the cancer survival rates. The US exceeds most countries by far.

Now, if you had said "Virtually all national healthcare system provide better care based on cost" I would have agreed with you.

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#57

Post by refurb »

afandian wrote: post #18
brixon wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The drugs might end up being cheaper, but there will be much less research for drugs (aka less drugs in the future). Greed is a good motivator.

I'm not much familiar with the system in the US, but I got the impression that the state already subsidises a large amount of the research anyway?

Big pharma/biotech spends about 2x what the NIH spends on research.

And that doesn't include the tens of billions in biotech VC funding.

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#58

Post by ams6110 »

JulianMorrison wrote: post #9

Drug creation needs to be nationalized, 100% tax funded all the way from researcher to trials to manufacture, and the drugs sold at cost thereafter. And the pharmaceuticals industry needs to just go away.

No, this will just make a bad problem worse. Overreaction in the extreme.

There may be a need to look at enforcing some more openness to formulas and manufacturing process so that after patents expire it's less possible to maintain an exclusive on a generic. That is consistent with the intent of patent protection and encourages open markets and competition.

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#59

Post by danmaz74 »

> With the price now high, other companies could conceivably make generic copies, since patents have long expired. One factor that could discourage that option is that Daraprim’s distribution is now tightly controlled, making it harder for generic companies to get the samples they need for the required testing.

> The switch from drugstores to controlled distribution was made in June by Impax, not by Turing.

This is the culprit, and honestly I have no idea what "controlled distribution" means in this context. Anybody would like to clarify?

Re: Drug Goes from $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight

#60

Post by refurb »

jakobdabo wrote: post #34
brixon wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The drugs might end up being cheaper, but there will be much less research for drugs (aka less drugs in the future). Greed is a good motivator.

The same greed makes the drug industry to develop drugs which treat the illness rather than cure it. Regular drug users are much better for them than one-time users.

This is an absolutely ridiculous statement. Last year Gilead sold a drug that cures hepatitis C. Cures!

The error in your thinking is that curing a patient results in less money than just chronically treating one. Not so!

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