The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective • Hacker News Board

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#101

Post by daveFNbuck » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 5:25 AM UTC

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #63

spaceflunky wrote: post #23

> “...the price of Daraprim hasn’t changed,” he said. He reached into his pocket and produced a handful of white pills. “I guess I better hand out some more,” Laufer said as he tossed the Daraprim into the audience. I found it hard to keep reading after that. What's it called when people get so emotional about a cause they just start acting irrationally and doing more harm than good?

It's definitely a stunt, but I don't see it as being particularly irresponsible. Daraprim's use is quite narrow and its side effects are pretty unpleasant; nobody's going to abuse it. It's not like he's throwing handfuls of homemade Ritalin.

I think it's pretty irresponsible to throw a handful of pills with nasty side effects into a crowd.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#102

Post by spaceflunky » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 5:31 AM UTC

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #63

spaceflunky wrote: post #23

> “...the price of Daraprim hasn’t changed,” he said. He reached into his pocket and produced a handful of white pills. “I guess I better hand out some more,” Laufer said as he tossed the Daraprim into the audience. I found it hard to keep reading after that. What's it called when people get so emotional about a cause they just start acting irrationally and doing more harm than good?

It's definitely a stunt, but I don't see it as being particularly irresponsible. Daraprim's use is quite narrow and its side effects are pretty unpleasant; nobody's going to abuse it. It's not like he's throwing handfuls of homemade Ritalin.

If a stunt, then why throw away and waste potentially useful medicine like that? I understand the point he's trying to make, but the way he goes about it underlines his childish view of everything.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#103

Post by vzcx » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:01 AM UTC

refurb wrote: post #93

As a former pharmaceutical chemist I’m calling bullshit. Could they have made a few grams of nalaxone? Sure it’s pretty simple. Did they make enough to make a difference? No. Did they make sufficiently pure drug so that people don’t get poisoned? Probably not. And did they make the AIDS drug? He’ll no. That synthesis is way more complicated than their mini lab can handle. It makes for good VICE articles, but these gu…

Is there some route to naloxone that I am not aware of that doesn't start from some opiate or opium alkaloid? The morphine total syntheses I've read were rather involved and low-yield. Perhaps progress made on the biosynthetic step through reticuline? That would be exciting.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#104

Post by shub » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:25 AM UTC

daveFNbuck wrote: post #101

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's definitely a stunt, but I don't see it as being particularly irresponsible. Daraprim's use is quite narrow and its side effects are pretty unpleasant; nobody's going to abuse it. It's not like he's throwing handfuls of homemade Ritalin.

I think it's pretty irresponsible to throw a handful of pills with nasty side effects into a crowd.

Why, on the off chance one flies into someone’s open mouth and the surprise triggers a swallowing reflex? I wouldn’t have a lot of sympathy for an adult who ate the homemade pills a guy threw at him and then suffered serious side effects.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#105

Post by tibu » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:28 AM UTC

sabujp wrote: post #78

klipt wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can "render" a movie onto my harddrive from bittorrent in minutes. I don't know why Pixar has to spend so much time on their rendering! /s

this is the worst analogy ever

Not really. Pixar has to render a movie before you can download it. Pfizer has to develop the medicine before you can synthesize it.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#106

Post by darawk » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:33 AM UTC

34k5uoi5ui wrote: post #57

gowld wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nice idea. Why don't single-payer healthcare systems (the ones who are already enlightened, compared to the backward USA, right?) fund that research today ? If pharma geniuses couldn't make a fortune in pharma, would they work for the government on the Federal wage scale, or would they go to coding bootcamp (which they could easily thrive at, based on the biochem->coding converts I know) and go work for Facebook?

because some people want to save lives, rather then enslaving them. If you think working at facebook is the pinnacle of human achievement, I respectfully request you consider where we are, and how many humans around you are suffering.

Then why are those people working at for-profit pharma companies? They can go start a non-profit one right now. They could do research.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#107

Post by darawk » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:35 AM UTC

ridgeguy wrote: post #91

darawk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok. Let's imagine a world where he achieves his dream. We've democratized access to molecular synthesis with no quality issues. Anyone, anywhere can safely and effectively produce any medicine of their choosing, without regard for IP laws. Now what? Well, on the one hand, everyone on earth will have cheap, timely access to every medicine that currently exists. That's pretty awesome. On the other hand, who's going to…

RoI may go beyond financial measures for some of us. I'd invest even if the only yield is longer/better life rather than $. More $ - not terribly important beyond a threshold. Longer/better life - yeah, that's important no matter how much money I have.

Sure. But in order to understand this, think about your own personal finances. Not theoretical super-rich you - current actual you. Are you going to buy the stock of a pharmaceutical company that develops drugs that aren't profitable? I'm not. And what that means is that companies developing unprofitable drugs don't get funding.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#108

Post by darawk » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:39 AM UTC

comicjk wrote: post #88

darawk wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want your medicine quality to go from hollywood blockbuster to home movie, I guess that's viable :).

What OP is saying is that movies are already copyable and yet blockbusters are still being made.

He edited his post. It said something a bit different originally. But to your point, drugs are a pretty different animal. A lot of drugs have a relatively niche market. Take the Hep C cure, for instance. The company that sells it charges something like $80,000 for it, which seems exorbitant to a lot of people.

But how much did it cost them to develop that drug? To get it through the FDA approval process? Their breakeven price on that drug is definitely in the tens of thousands per dose, before you get to any profit. Which means that at a minimum, they're charging $10,000/dose. In the case of movies, sure, i'll pay for netflix because it's more convenient than torrenting, because Netflix costs $10. If Netflix tried to raise their prices to $10,000/month, i'm going to start torrenting again.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#109

Post by darawk » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:40 AM UTC

Hasz wrote: post #52

darawk wrote: post #12

> Indeed, Laufer and his collaborators can’t stop pissing off powerful people because Four Thieves is living proof that effective medicines can be developed on a budget outside of institutional channels. Synthesized. Not developed. Synthesizing medicines is easy. Developing them is extremely difficult.

Eh, it's not as simple. From what it looks like, they're not just copying syntheses from the patent application. With this Chematica data, it seems like they were pursuing novel syntheses for a variety of drugs in order to minimize side product formation or make the synthesis easier, which is an impressive feat. That being said, they aren't running clinical trials or evaluating drug efficacy, which is another difficu…

You're right, they are doing something a bit novel, which is cool from a technical/hacker perspective. But clinical trials and efficacy aren't just 'another difficult part', they are the difficult part. Synthesis routes are an after-thought to any serious pharmaceutical company.

Re: The Four Thieves Vinegar Collective

#110

Post by darawk » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 6:41 AM UTC

gowld wrote: post #53

darawk wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone has to buy the lab equipment and pay the scientists. If you think their profit is 'exorbitant', then you should be investing in pharma. But historically and as a whole, they generate returns comparable to the rest of industry.

> If you think their profit is 'exorbitant', then you should be investing in pharma. is not necessarily true. Expected future returns are already priced into stock of incumbents.

You're correct. But look at their PE multiples and their margins. They're not wildly out of line with other companies.