Yeah that's almost every drug so what
Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
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Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#72Producing it is not the hard part. Researching it is... And you are not paid for your research "up front". It's added to the cost afterwards.
There is an awful lot of sympathy for the drug company in this thread. You are correct, research and approval is expensive. But at some point there is a limit. Things like insulin are long paid off, and the pricing there has generated controversy. People have been charged $1000 a month for it [1]. What’s fair? They are screaming out to be regulated when they behave so badly, and that’s what’s happened with insulin. […
> There is an awful lot of sympathy for the drug company in this thread.
And for good reason.
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is an awful lot of sympathy for the drug company in this thread. You are correct, research and approval is expensive. But at some point there is a limit. Things like insulin are long paid off, and the pricing there has generated controversy. People have been charged $1000 a month for it [1]. What’s fair? They are screaming out to be regulated when they behave so badly, and that’s what’s happened with insulin. […
Insulin isn't a single product. If you're not distinguishing between insulin extracted from a horse circa 1922 and a modern synthetic analog, well that's just not being honest. There's good arguments that the modern synthetic analogs are overpriced, but that's a more subtle argument.
When people complain about being forced to pay thousands a month for insulin, they're talking about the newest synthetic insulins that were developed very recently at substantial costs.
They could take the older insulins for $50 a month, no one is stopping them. It's just that those older products are less convenient.
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#74I think the complexity of the issue isn't really reflected by the article. The most obvious points that are missing are the risks associated with developing a new drug, the costs of research, and the regulatory requirements from the FDA Since pharmaceutical companies are, for the most part, publicly traded they're beholden to stock holders to create a profit. If they stop doing that they're in trouble If the ability…
Regulating drug pricing is what has started to happen. And I’ll bet they don’t like that. A single payer system would at least change the negotiating power that big pharma has - even in a small market, drug companies hate dealing with a single buying. Here in New Zealand the point even made it into the TPP agreement negotiations. The US wanting our (deeply imperfect) healthcare system to be a bit more like the US one…
Completely agree. That's part of why Ozempic is cheaper in Europe. I actually worked for the company who negotiates drug purchases for all hospitals here in Denmark (Amgros), so I'm somewhat familiar with the process
There's flaws in this approach as well, but in the end it's definitely an improvement to the issues US patients are facing in regards to costs
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#75this is the conundrum the US Pharma is facing. GLP1 took NN 10+ years of investment to come up. Acquired podcast has a great story about them. The middleman is what is different between the various country healthcare systems. USDOJ is trying/tried going after but one word - lobby. The regulation required is for consumer to directly buy from pharma skipping all middlemen. my 2cents.
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not Pharma industry expert but ... I'm pretty sure it's much the same as venture capital. That is to say that's it's not that expensive to R&D it, certainly compared to the eventual sale price, but it's carrying the cost of the hundred potential drugs that never made it to market that's the killer.
It takes $300m to $2B to get a drug approved. And the approval rate is less than 12%. The crazy pricing is to compensate for the failed projects. Also, it's not like you can bootstrap yourself or grow organically like Startups. You have to wait for like 10 - 15 years. To actually start selling it. [1]: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.policymed.com/amp/2014/12/a...
> Also, it's not like you can bootstrap yourself or grow organically like Startups.
So if they have a effectively built monopoly, chopping down the maximum they can charge via regulation would seem sensible wouldn’t it?
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
What I find weirder is that people chase Ozempic even though they have introduced Wegovy. Which is basically the same drug but without glycemic control and hence more suited for non-diabetics. Both are Semaglutides and Wegovy directly targets weight loss.
> Which is basically the same drug but without glycemic control No... The effects are the same because they are exactly the same drug (semaglutide), the difference is the dosing schedule and max dose (wegovy is 2.4mg and ozempic is 2mg).
Pretty weird diabetics have a lower dose
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
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I get that point, but given that Ozempic sells for significantly less in other countries I think it's worth considering why it's that much more expensive in the US
It's because those other countries are free riders.
I think we should do the same thing in reverse on limiting CO2 emissions. How does that sound?
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#79Producing it is not the hard part. Researching it is... And you are not paid for your research "up front". It's added to the cost afterwards.
There's not a single drug company on the market that stops charging a high price for a drug as soon its covered its research expenditure.
Should they not profit on that capital invested for that research? Do landlords drop rents when the loan is paid off? Of course not, they’re going to price rents what the market supports. Competition is what makes markets work. Invent a drug? And someone else invents a similar drug? Prices will go down.
Re: Novo Nordisk facing pressure as study finds $1k drug can be made for $5
#80this is the conundrum the US Pharma is facing. GLP1 took NN 10+ years of investment to come up. Acquired podcast has a great story about them. The middleman is what is different between the various country healthcare systems. USDOJ is trying/tried going after but one word - lobby. The regulation required is for consumer to directly buy from pharma skipping all middlemen. my 2cents.
NN didn't come up with GLP1. It's a natural peptide, and people have been taking it for a very long time. Nordisk did get it approved, yes, and that was costly, but let's not massively overstate the innovation.
Semaglutide is not GLP1, it's a bit different. But it's not the first GLP1 analog. It's not even the first to be approved : AstraZeneca was the first to get a GLP1 agonist approved, in 2005. In fact, it even is used off label for obesity.
Nordisk's big break was convincing the regulators to get it approved for obesity and not just type 2 diabetes.