111–120 of 127 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That said, patent restrictions are arguably the only reason the drug exists in the first place. So let's not get out over our skis here.
Gilead can still be paid for the treatments produced, but if they cannot create supply to meet demand during an unprecedented crisis, they should not be allowed to become the bottleneck.
According to the article 500,000 doses are the production of July, and 90% of August and September. Three full months would be 500,000 / 2.80 * 3 = 535,714 doses. A full treatment is made of six doses. There are 89,285 treatments in there. Less than 30,000 per month. Too bad for the rest of the world that all of them will happen in the USA but they are way too few to matter globally. Split them proportionally with th…
See this post:
If there is already alternative suppliers of this drug in India (as claimed by the article) under generic brands, can't they do a licensing deal for the drug and use that production while still not ignoring patent laws? can't tell if this is a supply chain (production) problem or patent laws dilemma.
I think the problem is that gilead has already announced that they’re planning on charging something in the order of $3k per treatment, which won’t work in most of the world, and is a sure fire way to get countries to start asking questions about the value proposition of drug patents. Basically if you have a company in India willing to manufacture for say $200, Gilead will still charge the same amount, so licensing i…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think that law was changed in 2005 to allow product patents.
The law might have been changed, but the practice of the law has not. India still does not honor practically any foreign patents on medicine.
Sounds like the Guardian isn't happy its home country got out-bid. Did it expect that America would buy less of a potentially life-saving drug, effectively prioritizing the welfare of foreigners over her own? I'd expect any government to act in such a manner.
I agree media is making a big deal out of this. But, would our reaction be still the same if Guardian's headline said China or Russia did this? Probably not. Perhaps we would even talk about putting new sanctions. I think the right move would be allowing other companies to produce enough of it. If that means financially supporting Gilead, let's do that. Then nobody has to take all the stockpile.
Nope. There are about a billion other reasons both should be sanctioned to the point of embargo, but this isn't one. Nations have been fighting each other for resources for months now. That's to be expected in a high-demand, low-supply environment where each wants to save as many of her citizens as possible, and I wouldn't blame China or Russia for taking similar actions. For instance, I don't really blame China for having restricted exports of PPE because of greater need at home. I'd rather America get her hands on more stuff, but I'd expect any competent government to act in the interests of her citizens and so can't fault China (at least, not for this).
> I think the right move would be allowing other companies to produce enough of it. If that means financially supporting Gilead, let's do that. Then nobody has to take all the stockpile.
This is definitely a good approach, but this drug is pretty hard to make, so I'm not sure another company could just start making it easily [0]. However, Gilead has already been working with partner companies to ramp up production [1], which will allow them to benefit from all the work Gilead has put in to figuring out how to produce it at scale.
[0]: https://www.acsh.org/news/2020/03/26/problem-remdesivir-maki...
[1]: https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/30/gileads-remdesivir-has-s...
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Lol if you think investors are getting 1000x returns then why aren’t you investing in all the pharma companies :)
I wrote looking to make 1000x returns, not getting 1000x returns. If I was investing into pharma R&D, I would also be looking for commensurate returns and there’s nothing wrong with that. Developing medicines is a high risk venture. But the rewards are extremely high also, so maybe it merits the resources of all of society. This is ignoring that US taxpayers already pay for a significant portion of the R&D via univer…
"The drug, which was invented for Ebola but failed to work, is under patent to Gilead, which means no other company in wealthy countries can make it." Sorry, but if the one blessed company with the patent can't keep up with demand, and millions are going to die because there are patent restrictions, then ignore the patent laws and save some lives. It wouldn't look too good if the American government tried to stop it,…
The last studies I saw showed Remdesivir didn't actually save lives. Unless some very different studies have come out, this is just a politically connected pharma company using the pandemic to get a fat check from the US government. This is just your standard every day corruption.
So in theory it could save lives if it keeps Karen and Becky out of the ER.
"The drug, which was invented for Ebola but failed to work, is under patent to Gilead, which means no other company in wealthy countries can make it." Sorry, but if the one blessed company with the patent can't keep up with demand, and millions are going to die because there are patent restrictions, then ignore the patent laws and save some lives. It wouldn't look too good if the American government tried to stop it,…
The last studies I saw showed Remdesivir didn't actually save lives. Unless some very different studies have come out, this is just a politically connected pharma company using the pandemic to get a fat check from the US government. This is just your standard every day corruption.
"The drug, which was invented for Ebola but failed to work, is under patent to Gilead, which means no other company in wealthy countries can make it." Sorry, but if the one blessed company with the patent can't keep up with demand, and millions are going to die because there are patent restrictions, then ignore the patent laws and save some lives. It wouldn't look too good if the American government tried to stop it,…
As a Canadian, I've seen our government repeatedly threaten to bypass US drug patents in the last trade war we had with the US.
And frankly, the cheaper drugs are for the consumer, generic or otherwise, the better. I'm certain that a life-saving drug won't be getting skipped because of a patent dispute.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is that supposed to make someone angry? Because this seems like an okay solution to make back investments and still allow cheaper access for poorer nations. Still if they can't keep up with demand and there are many lifes at stake, we should probably legislate a compensated invalidation of such a patent.
The US is not the entirety of the countries they reserve to themselves. This process was not decided on as the most efficient by any sort of entity with an interest in public health - it's a private company performing a "goodwill" gesture.
I'm certain that the CEO knows just how fickle the patent is and wants to maintain as much control, gain as much money, favors etc while reducing risks, liability, losses etc.