Maybe the insurance should pay substantial amount for drugs/treatment AFTER the patient is cured completely
Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
41–50 of 188 posts
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#42The suggestions on making sustainable cures: “Solution 1: Address large markets: Hemophilia is a $9-10bn WW market (hemophilia A, B), growing at ~6-7% annually.” “Solution 2: Address disorders with high incidence: Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) affects the cells (neurons) in the spinal cord, impacting the ability to walk, eat, or breathe.” “Solution 3: Constant innovation and portfolio expansion: There are hundreds of…
Obviously a hemophilia cure is a bad investment, recurring lifelong hemophilia treatment is very much more attractive.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#43Maybe the insurance should pay substantial amount for drugs/treatment AFTER the patient is cured completely
That’s sort of the case. Gilead’s cure for Hep C (cited in the article) costs more than treating it.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#44It doesn’t matter if it is a sustainable business. People will do what they can to maximize their income now. If 10 companies are withholding a cure to milk the patients, any one of them can break from that strategy at any time, with near-instant financial reward and competitive advantage. It is not a stable equilibrium.
Yet meanwhile, women entered the legal profession in the 1920's but wages did not catch up until the 1960's when the Equal Pay Act was passed. Economics 101 would say you could snap up competent female lawyers for a little more than they were paid at their current firm and thus wages would creep up, yet this would not happen.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#45I feel kinda bad for the writer, because it's a good question: no, curing patients is not a good business model, just like public transit is not a good business model. What a lot of folks neglect are N+1-order effects, because those are harder to quantify and fail to reach the predetermined decision some executive or board or shareholder has already made. Is curing patients a bad business model? Sure, for the biotech…
>just like public transit is not a good business model.
Uber has almost a 200B market cap for offering private transit. There is a working business model for transit.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#46We get threads about this on HN a couple times a year, and I feel like people have never thought this through. The company that cures T1D or MS will make approximately eleventy jillion dollars. The mustache-twirlers engineering MS into a chronic manageable disease rather than curing it would simply be outcompeted and put out of business by the straight-mustached cure owners. If you believe the mustache-twirlers are capable of suppressing knowledge of a viable cure, I'm going to have fun selling you on a lot of more-plausible conspiracy theories; for instance, the faked moon landing, which would have required less collusion and been less impactful to the world.
In a strict sense, curing a single disease isn't a long term "sustainable business", because you'll eventually push the population of affected patients below a threshold of profitability. The premise of a major pharma company is that they keep finding other treatments.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#47I feel kinda bad for the writer, because it's a good question: no, curing patients is not a good business model, just like public transit is not a good business model. What a lot of folks neglect are N+1-order effects, because those are harder to quantify and fail to reach the predetermined decision some executive or board or shareholder has already made. Is curing patients a bad business model? Sure, for the biotech…
If a person dies from a disorder in their 20s, they'll never buy your heart medication in their 70s. Today's patient is tomorrow's patient.
Treat vs cure. You treat them so you can go on treating them. If you cure them, maybe you’ll treat them later and or maybe you won’t - but that’s outside the current bonus cycle / opportunity window.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
As long as government regulation prevents them from forming a cartel.
It shouldnt be limited to companies within the country. Any foreign company can be a market disruptor here. Assuming the drug approval admin isnt working alongside the 'cartel'.
And then there's medical tourism, for the people who prefer to shop at one of the other 'cartels'
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#49I feel kinda bad for the writer, because it's a good question: no, curing patients is not a good business model, just like public transit is not a good business model. What a lot of folks neglect are N+1-order effects, because those are harder to quantify and fail to reach the predetermined decision some executive or board or shareholder has already made. Is curing patients a bad business model? Sure, for the biotech…
>just like public transit is not a good business model. Uber has almost a 200B market cap for offering private transit. There is a working business model for transit.
Uber's business model is to be a loss leader to hamper competition, then jack up rider rates and lower drive rates. This is technically a 'working' business model, but hardly one that benefits the people.
Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)
#50Previously:
2018: 448 points, 370 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16827248
2021: 104 points, 100 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27184116