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Dutch join backlash at expensive drugs by making their own

reuters.com

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

#21

Post by zaroth »

wjnc wrote: post #18
zaroth wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The pharmaceutical company Vertex sells the drug for $300k. Because CF Foundation helped fund the development, they get royalties, just like universities sometimes do when they help develop a drug.

This is great for CF because it’s mostly the insurance companies (and therefore healthy people) who are bearing the costs of the treatment.

So the CF Foundation is “forcing donatations” from the healthy populace through increased insurance premiums to bankroll their continued investments in treatments and such.

I don’t know if that makes it any more or less ethical, but certainly if it were mostly individual CF patients on the hook for the $300k (in aggregate that is — I’m not saying that never happens) then it would make less sense for the CF Foundation as a strategy.

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

#22

Post by netjiro »

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…

> Funds which they will use to drive massive amounts of additional R&D to make even better treatments at lower costs.

This is a _myth_

Big Pharma is an insanely inefficient structure for turning money into useful R&D results.

Big Pharma often spends on the order of 25-30% on marketing, vs 15% on R&D. From societal standpoint this is horribly inefficient considering that most medical costs are paid for communal money via taxes and/or insurance programs.

R&D should be paid by government funds. Testing should be transparent and open. Production should be done by private companies. This would be a significantly more efficient use of our money. It would also align R&D expenditures much better with actual costs to society for medical issues.

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

#23

Post by rayiner »

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 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?

It says so in the first few paragraphs: Novartis licensed (bought) the right to sell the drug in Europe. The patents remain with the hospital.

The hospital that developed the drug is a public hospital associated with a public university. So the government paid for development, and (indirectly) to government is benefitting from the license fees paid by Novartis. That is co-profiting.

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

#24

Post by radicalbyte »

It's worth noting that pharmacists in The Netherlands have a doctorate and the same training requirements as MDs (the study last until 24/25 with no skip years). The requirements are considerably lower in other countries (in the UK for example they just need a BSc).

Source: my wife is a pharmacist and could have worked in the UK after only completing 1/3rd of her study.

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

#26

Post by rayiner »

netjiro wrote: post #22
zaroth wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> Funds which they will use to drive massive amounts of additional R&D to make even better treatments at lower costs. This is a _myth_ Big Pharma is an insanely inefficient structure for turning money into useful R&D results. Big Pharma often spends on the order of 25-30% on marketing, vs 15% on R&D. From societal standpoint this is horribly inefficient considering that most medical costs are paid for communal money…

Typical R&D spend in pharma as percentage of revenues is 10-20%. That’s in the same range as Google, Intel, or Microsoft, which are widely considered to be very efficient structures for turning money into innovation. By your reasoning, we could cut out a lot of the fat and get better R&D for less by nationalizing Google.

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

#27

Post by eecc »

rayiner wrote: post #23
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 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? It says so in the first few paragraphs: Novartis licensed (bought) the right to sell the drug in Europe. The patents remain with the hospital. The hospital that developed the drug is a public hospital associated with a public university…

The article reads as follows:

“Novartis bought the rights to Lutathera with a $3.9-billion-euro takeover of French company AAA last year.”

Where exactly does it say that the patents have remained with the hospital?

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

#28

Post by Luc »

radicalbyte wrote: post #24

It's worth noting that pharmacists in The Netherlands have a doctorate and the same training requirements as MDs (the study last until 24/25 with no skip years). The requirements are considerably lower in other countries (in the UK for example they just need a BSc). Source: my wife is a pharmacist and could have worked in the UK after only completing 1/3rd of her study.

It's a 6 year study, but like the study for Medical Doctor, at the end you have a Masters diploma, not a Phd/Doctorate.

Source: apotheek.nl e.a.

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

#29

Post by eecc »

rayiner wrote: post #26
netjiro wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Funds which they will use to drive massive amounts of additional R&D to make even better treatments at lower costs. This is a _myth_ Big Pharma is an insanely inefficient structure for turning money into useful R&D results. Big Pharma often spends on the order of 25-30% on marketing, vs 15% on R&D. From societal standpoint this is horribly inefficient considering that most medical costs are paid for communal money…

Typical R&D spend in pharma as percentage of revenues is 10-20%. That’s in the same range as Google, Intel, or Microsoft, which are widely considered to be very efficient structures for turning money into innovation. By your reasoning, we could cut out a lot of the fat and get better R&D for less by nationalizing Google.

Of the main customer of Google was the government itself then why not? (The point is: it’s not. So so what’s your point?)

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

#30

Post by eecc »

aaavl2821 wrote: post #16
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…

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

Please provide conclusive proof this process is not consequence of neoliberal policies, aimed at defunding public spending and encouraging for-profit spinoffs, aligning the research process to its ideology
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