Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own • Hacker News Board

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#11

Post by xorcist » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 9:44 AM UTC

wjnc wrote: post #2

The killer detail (in the article) is that 1/3 of the (small) development cost of 40 million were borne by the Dutch tax payer. How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? Who funds this and what kind of shit lawyers and economists draw up the funding schemes that give away full intellectual property, only with a (historic) backstop for individual preparation? We need risked based co-funding, co-profiting (…

> How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio?

While it may sound strange put that way, most universities spend a lot of time thinking about how spin off profitable companies from their research. It's a huge deal and public spending on research is often motivated like this. Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing.

The morally dubious outcome of this is that a lot of research ends up locked away as intellectual property of some private entity, but it's not easy to question.

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#12

Post by zaroth » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:22 AM UTC

yread wrote: post #6

wjnc wrote: post #2

The killer detail (in the article) is that 1/3 of the (small) development cost of 40 million were borne by the Dutch tax payer. How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? Who funds this and what kind of shit lawyers and economists draw up the funding schemes that give away full intellectual property, only with a (historic) backstop for individual preparation? We need risked based co-funding, co-profiting (…

That's also not a silver bullet see CF where foundation funded research and sold the IP to pharma company for 3.3B$ and the patients were then charged 300k a year for it. https://philanthropynewsdigest.org/news/cystic-fibrosis-foun...

I think you have cause and effect reversed.

They helped fund the development of the new CF drug by Vertex, which Vertex sells for $300k. Because of the success of the drug, they were able to resell their royalty rights to another investor for $3.3 billion.

Funds which they will use to drive massive amounts of additional R&D to make even better treatments at lower costs. In the process they have created therapies which did not previously exist, saving and improving people’s lives.

You can debate the profit motive (as your link mentions) but the Foundation considers this a massive win for their ability to fight CF and make CF sufferers lives better.

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#13

Post by username223 » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:35 AM UTC

xorcist wrote: post #11

wjnc wrote: post #2

The killer detail (in the article) is that 1/3 of the (small) development cost of 40 million were borne by the Dutch tax payer. How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? Who funds this and what kind of shit lawyers and economists draw up the funding schemes that give away full intellectual property, only with a (historic) backstop for individual preparation? We need risked based co-funding, co-profiting (…

> How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? While it may sound strange put that way, most universities spend a lot of time thinking about how spin off profitable companies from their research. It's a huge deal and public spending on research is often motivated like this. Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing. The morally dubious outco…

> Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing.

Is it? At best, I'd say it's seen as a "necessary evil," where "evil" is much more certain than "necessary."

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#14

Post by benj111 » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:38 AM UTC

lordnacho wrote: post #9

wjnc wrote: post #2

The killer detail (in the article) is that 1/3 of the (small) development cost of 40 million were borne by the Dutch tax payer. How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? Who funds this and what kind of shit lawyers and economists draw up the funding schemes that give away full intellectual property, only with a (historic) backstop for individual preparation? We need risked based co-funding, co-profiting (…

The pharma will likely also be employing people who were trained on the public bankroll. Not sure what's reasonable there though, it's not like society owns your output because you had your education paid for.

I'm not sure if we are thinking of different things, but in the UK I believe Drs and Nurses have to stay with the NHS (or at least not work for the private sector) for a certain period of time, if they got bursaries. That seems reasonable? Society benefits from their output, in return for paying for their education.

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#15

Post by vilifiedtwin » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:51 AM UTC

Governments are corrupt and so the law enforcement so I think the only hope is that army will look into how big pharma shapes the national policy and makes sure the broken system keeps going on.

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#16

Post by aaavl2821 » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:57 AM UTC

xorcist wrote: post #11

wjnc wrote: post #2

The killer detail (in the article) is that 1/3 of the (small) development cost of 40 million were borne by the Dutch tax payer. How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? Who funds this and what kind of shit lawyers and economists draw up the funding schemes that give away full intellectual property, only with a (historic) backstop for individual preparation? We need risked based co-funding, co-profiting (…

> How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? While it may sound strange put that way, most universities spend a lot of time thinking about how spin off profitable companies from their research. It's a huge deal and public spending on research is often motivated like this. Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing. The morally dubious outco…

without for profit companies, all that taxpayer funded research would be sitting on a shelf, never becoming medicines to treat patients. In the last 2 years I think every drug that got approved by FDA was developed by a for profit company.

Drugs don't emerge fully formed from academia, just waiting for pharma to patent them and jack up the price. Pharma spends more on r&d than academia

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#17

Post by tomcam » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 11:00 AM UTC

username223 wrote: post #13

xorcist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? While it may sound strange put that way, most universities spend a lot of time thinking about how spin off profitable companies from their research. It's a huge deal and public spending on research is often motivated like this. Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing. The morally dubious outco…

> Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing. Is it? At best, I'd say it's seen as a "necessary evil," where "evil" is much more certain than "necessary."

It stinks, I agree. What economic/social arrangement has done a better job in drug innovation?

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#18

Post by wjnc » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 11:08 AM UTC

zaroth wrote: post #12

yread wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's also not a silver bullet see CF where foundation funded research and sold the IP to pharma company for 3.3B$ and the patients were then charged 300k a year for it. https://philanthropynewsdigest.org/news/cystic-fibrosis-foun...

I think you have cause and effect reversed. They helped fund the development of the new CF drug by Vertex, which Vertex sells for $300k. Because of the success of the drug, they were able to resell their royalty rights to another investor for $3.3 billion. Funds which they will use to drive massive amounts of additional R&D to make even better treatments at lower costs. In the process they have created therapies whic…

The important question is... why is it ethical for a foundation to deliver a product at $300k/yr where the cost are borne by other people? [1] In my world that price would never be paid, since about €100k/yr would max out the qaly. They would still have their medicine albeit at a perhaps $1 billion profit / return on risk. I'll bet my ethical balls here that none of the small contributors to a CF foundation expect a billion dollar windfall to come out if there contribution, regardless the merits that billion goes to afterwards.

[1] Some economic reductionism here: if you know the cash flow, you can project the value and the other way around. So if someone offers you 3 billion and you know the effect of the medicine and the number of patients, you can infer the price of the medicine. This to establish the (moral) link between the selling of the IP and the price.

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#19

Post by aaavl2821 » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 11:10 AM UTC

rocqua wrote: post #3

Yes, less payout on rare disease drugs is less of an incentive to research them. But: * Drug companies have profit margins of 15% on average indicating there is room. * many recent 'orphan drugs' were not newly developed, but off-label uses registered with the FDA for a whole new patent. * these drugs rely heavily on research done by universities through public funding. It stands to reason the public should get to be…

Drug companies increasingly fund r&d with their balance sheet, not with internal r&d. So the money they pay for new drugs is not reflected in the profit and loss statement.

There are maybe 15 pharma companies that commercialize a large portion of the drugs developed in the world. The vast vast majority of drug companies never make a penny in profit. They sell their products or companies to bigger, commercial companies

So the profits in the industry all accrue to a few big players, and the losses largely accrue to companies you've never heard of

Something like 65% of FDA approved drugs are developed by small companies that will never generate revenue. Bigger companies buy these drugs and plug them into their established sales forces

Virtually (probably literally in the last few years) no drugs emerge fully formed from academia. For profit companies bear the brunt of the r&d costs. 30% of public r&d goes to academic "overhead" and much goes to research that will never come close to informing drug r&d. The NIH spends $30-35B a year, the top 15 pharma companies spend $75B in r&d

Re: Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

#20

Post by xorcist » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 11:20 AM UTC

username223 wrote: post #13

xorcist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How did that patent end up in a big pharma portfolio? While it may sound strange put that way, most universities spend a lot of time thinking about how spin off profitable companies from their research. It's a huge deal and public spending on research is often motivated like this. Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing. The morally dubious outco…

> Universities and R&D companies have a codependent relationship and this is generally regarded as a good thing. Is it? At best, I'd say it's seen as a "necessary evil," where "evil" is much more certain than "necessary."

I think so. Funding research is difficult as it is, and the potential to leverage that spending to create jobs and tax income is important. It certainly helps that it concerns an highly qualified academic workforce. Most universities tend to keep people employed just to expedite the process.