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Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

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Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#141

Post by habinero »

ninetyninenine wrote: post #133
tptacek wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying that curing diseases is a bad business model is like saying discovering the world's largest gold mine would be a bad business because you'd eventually run out of gold. The underlying argument doesn't make sense.

[flagged]

I'm sorry, but if you _actually_ think about it, your whole premise is ridiculous.

We'll put aside the obvious fact that drug researchers are, you know, people who presumably got into the industry to help people, which includes themselves and their families.

We'll also put aside the fact that drugs go out of patent relatively quickly, and they'd just lose out to generics. Like they do now.

The simple truth is they don't need to manufacture more clients, because a stream already exists. There are always new people developing new diseases and new issues. There's an incentive to come up with new and better tools to pull money away from generics.

Don't fall prey to paranoid thinking, actually think about it.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#142

Post by wodenokoto »

anonymouskimmer wrote: post #28
stego-tech wrote: post #22

I 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.

That is not the alternative to curing disease that is being proposed. The choice is between healing for good or keep on continued medication.

Or more bluntly: sell a product or sell a subscription

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#143

Post by big-and-small »

spankibalt wrote: post #23

> "Is curing patients a sustainable business?" The question is: If a capitalist (or agent in a capitalist system) has a choice between a) investing to produce/producing a cure, or b) investing to produce/producing a more-or-less working symptomatic relief, how many agents/capitalists (in decision-making positions) go for choice B, which essentially turns them into legal drug pushers with a money-printing license?

Capitalist system solve this with competition. If there is already market of people paying for more-or-less working symptomatic relief then it's proof these people are actually a good market to sell a cure for x100 price of relief.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#144

Post by beeflet »

tptacek wrote: post #105
beeflet wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy that the moon landing is easier to fake than the existence of a cure.

Scientists are routinely independently re-discovering each others discoveries. The effort to discover cures to important disease is intense. The conspiracy to suppress a cure would have to be vast.

You don't have to suppress a cure, you can just choose not to release information that reveal one or spend research money in directions that lead to a cure.

Also, not that vast if you consider the amount of people who have the information needed to realize what is going on.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#145

Post by casey2 »

itake wrote: post #125
stego-tech wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The longer someone lives, the more potential value they can contribute to a society. The opportunity cost is something we've figured out from a medical perspective, but shareholders want returns today, not returns fifty years from now. That is what we need to address.

The government says that people can stop contributing to society when they reach 67. Some governments completely block you from continuing working. Some governments recognize that the longer people life, the more pensions / social security / healthcare resources need to be paid to that person. its much cheaper for governments for people to just die when they retire, tax their wealth at 40% and then free up resources…

No, again because of secondary effects, which of course the government keeps track of both implicitly and explicitly.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#146

Post by DrScientist »

stego-tech wrote: post #22

I 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…

There are also higher order effects in terms of business model - if you look at the broader business model of health care.

A concrete examples abound in the infectious disease space - many antibiotics are curative of something that would otherwise be fatal - and while there isn't a huge amount of money in antibiotics it has in effect contributed to the larger market of older people's diseases like cancer.

Every intervention simply delays death - and the older you get the more health care you need.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#147

Post by PretzelJudge »

apparent wrote: post #71

This reminds me of the new-ish treatments that promise to regrow tooth enamel or prevent the growth of bacteria that causes cavities. These won't get widespread adoption until the American Dental Association or whatever says they're safe/effective, but there's a clear conflict of interest because it would have a huge negative impact on their members' business model. There's money to be made selling a cure, but the cr…

There are 190+ other countries that can also approve it (or that aren’t organized enough to care about drug approvals). If there was an amazing treatment working in Lichtenstein, we’d hear about it.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#148

Post by DrScientist »

stego-tech wrote: post #22

I 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…

>As long as the value created is more than the cost of the treatment, then it's a net-gain for the economy even if it's a net loss for that singular business.

Specifically on this - this is pretty much how pharma companies negotiate prices with governments - using quality adjusted years of life or saving from alternative costs.

> If all you're judging is the first-order impacts on a single business,

However you do have to pay the companies involved otherwise the activity doesn't happen ( as the companies will go bust and cease to exist ) - cf lack of significant research into new antibiotics.

That's why the above happens.

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#149

Post by netsharc »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #90
socalgal2 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ~public~ transit is not a good business model. ~public~ transit can be a good business model if it's setup correctly. The majority of Japan's 100 train companies are setup such that they own both trains and complementary interests. Office buildings, shopping centers, super markets, apartments. The better their trains are the better their other businesses do by delivering people to them. The better their other busin…

This reminds me of the way ski resorts work in the US. One company builds the ski resort (losing) but also develops all the real estate around it (winning). It only works if it's a resort worth living near. Or casinos, which are the reverse. Build hotels, entertainment etc (losing) to support traffic to your casino (winning)

Won't real estate near ski resorts become hotels? Or does the word "resort" mean there are on-site hotels?

Re: Goldman Sachs asks in biotech Report: Is curing patients a sustainable business? (2018)

#150

Post by randerson »

snowwrestler wrote: post #7

It 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.

Not if one of those companies patents the cure.
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