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India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

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Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#21

Post by codemac »

ashishgandhi wrote: post #17
cdooh wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also speaking as someone who's lost friends to cancer, I'd not like it if the drug was there but out of my reach because it was too expensive. It's like looking through glass, you can see the other side but you can't get through

I don't believe the right answer to solving the cost problem is stealing (super) costly inventions. Cheaper and more widely accessible healthcare would probably be the more apt choice if you ask me. Debate about models such as free public healthcare, compulsory insurance, compulsory insurance where the government pays the difference that the less wealthy can't make up for, etc. would be more apt I feel. Also discussi…

The only possible incentive is money?

I think you're selling humanity short. There are plenty of ways to have society prioritize researching drug therapies for different diseases that don't hinge on reaping massive profit on the sales of the drug. See: public funding. I don't necessarily mean that through government/taxes, but it should certainly be an option.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#22

Post by anaheim »

ashishgandhi wrote: post #13

Indian pharmaceuticals are a joke. They have zero inventions to their name. Their "secret" to selling drugs cheap lays in the following line from the article. "In 1972, India made only the process for making drugs patentable, not the drugs themselves." Do you really think this is smart? Heavy R&D costs are involved in coming up with compounds that save lives. If you only have the manufacturing process that's patentab…

cost to invent drugs = identifying compounds (90%, say) + determining manufacturing process (10%)

^ Where are you getting these numbers from? They seem way too simplistic, and your argument essentially falls apart without them.

Real 'invention cost' would be determined by far more factors - cost of raw materials

- labour cost (I bet it's cheaper for pharmaceutical companies to pay workers much lesser in India too.),

- whether your competitors are targeting the same market (if these companies stopped researching said drugs, Cipla would come up with a cheaper way to do the R&D required, and then make a killing, even with their low rates, since they would have cornered the market.)

Plus the goodwill of Govts of developing countries that are offered these medicines at low rates may lead to fruitful collaboration with national research institutes in those countries, thereby lessening the need for enormous profit margins anyway.

As someone said below, the fact that there is more money to be made selling iPads rather than bread does not mean that everyone switches to making iPads.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#23

Post by ams6110 »

kkowalczyk wrote: post #15
ig1 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that if these drugs end up entering the grey market in the developed world, it disincentives investment in the next generation of drugs. Huge amounts of money have to be raised to make a new drug. The cost of bringing a new drug to market is typically $800m-$1.2bn (i.e more than exit value of Instagram or Yammer is required just to get to launch). With treatments for viruses it gets even more problemat…

This argument is demonstrably false. Look at any commodity market, with no barriers to entry, no IP protection, thin margins, say: making bread. The logic that everybody will stop making bread because there's more money to be made in making iPads is false. The general rule is: as long as there is money to be made, people will compete for this money. There's a lot of money to be made in drugs and as long as it's true,…

I don't get the comparison to commodity markets or markets for commonplace things like bread. There aren't any high barriers to entry in bread business, it doesn't require a lot of specialized skill or R&D, and consequently there is not a lot of room for profit.

Pharmaceuticals involve high liability, high costs, and highly skilled workers at least in the R&D area. I'm not sure whether the "net income" (it doesn't say profit) listed on that wikipedia page is net of R&D and net of taxes. Actual profit might be much smaller than it appears; if R&D is not included then the top firm has a profit of 8% and that may not include taxes. If they are only able to make bread-bakers profits they might as well just make bread and avoid all the hassle.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#24

Post by yashchandra »

ashishgandhi wrote: post #17
cdooh wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also speaking as someone who's lost friends to cancer, I'd not like it if the drug was there but out of my reach because it was too expensive. It's like looking through glass, you can see the other side but you can't get through

I don't believe the right answer to solving the cost problem is stealing (super) costly inventions. Cheaper and more widely accessible healthcare would probably be the more apt choice if you ask me. Debate about models such as free public healthcare, compulsory insurance, compulsory insurance where the government pays the difference that the less wealthy can't make up for, etc. would be more apt I feel. Also discussi…

We all can take a lesson or two from Dr. Jonas Salk.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#25

Post by ams6110 »

codemac wrote: post #21
ashishgandhi wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe the right answer to solving the cost problem is stealing (super) costly inventions. Cheaper and more widely accessible healthcare would probably be the more apt choice if you ask me. Debate about models such as free public healthcare, compulsory insurance, compulsory insurance where the government pays the difference that the less wealthy can't make up for, etc. would be more apt I feel. Also discussi…

The only possible incentive is money? I think you're selling humanity short. There are plenty of ways to have society prioritize researching drug therapies for different diseases that don't hinge on reaping massive profit on the sales of the drug. See: public funding. I don't necessarily mean that through government/taxes, but it should certainly be an option.

The NSF funds a LOT of public university research in medicine. So do the drug companies.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#26

Post by ams6110 »

WiseWeasel wrote: post #11
ig1 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that if these drugs end up entering the grey market in the developed world, it disincentives investment in the next generation of drugs. Huge amounts of money have to be raised to make a new drug. The cost of bringing a new drug to market is typically $800m-$1.2bn (i.e more than exit value of Instagram or Yammer is required just to get to launch). With treatments for viruses it gets even more problemat…

Maybe the US is simply a poor market to launch new drugs into, if it costs that much to get it to market. It might be better to launch in other countries, like India, and then work towards a US launch after extensive use data is available.

Most people are averse to the idea using human beings as guinea pigs, even if they are poor.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#27

Post by [deleted] »

deadbea7 wrote: post #3
drsim wrote: post #2

The world needs more people like him: in a position of power with the guts to stick it to companies who put money before humanitarianism.

I would also give credit to Indian patent laws that allow people like him to shake things up. "In 1972, India made only the process for making drugs patentable, not the drugs themselves." Compare this to the US where I believe you can patent the active ingredients of a drug, allowing pharmaceuticals to charge more for lifesaving medicine for a longer period of time.

[deleted]

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#28

Post by smallblacksun »

mistercow wrote: post #10
uvdiv wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also sets the value of discovering new drugs at $0. What's smart about that?

Really, you think the value of having a monopoly on the only known process for making a drug and being first to market with that drug is $0?

Not 0, but vastly less than the cost of discovering and getting approval for a new drug. The vast majority of medical compounds are not particularly difficult to synthesize, meaning that the value of the process patent is relatively small. Once you release the drug, you will only have a very brief period before a competitor is able to come to market. In particular, they will not need to undergo clinical trials, which are very long (multiple years) and expensive (often hundreds of millions of dollars).

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#29

Post by Retric »

ams6110 wrote: post #25
codemac wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only possible incentive is money? I think you're selling humanity short. There are plenty of ways to have society prioritize researching drug therapies for different diseases that don't hinge on reaping massive profit on the sales of the drug. See: public funding. I don't necessarily mean that through government/taxes, but it should certainly be an option.

The NSF funds a LOT of public university research in medicine. So do the drug companies.

Major drug companies fun a lot of drug trials, but they buy most drug research. That might seem like the same thing to US but if your country does not feel the need for FDA style drug testing you may not feel there is any need to cut them into the game.

Re: India firm shakes up cancer drug market with price cuts

#30

Post by ftwinnovations »

cdooh wrote: post #18
ashishgandhi wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe the right answer to solving the cost problem is stealing (super) costly inventions. Cheaper and more widely accessible healthcare would probably be the more apt choice if you ask me. Debate about models such as free public healthcare, compulsory insurance, compulsory insurance where the government pays the difference that the less wealthy can't make up for, etc. would be more apt I feel. Also discussi…

I concede to your superior argument. There is a better way to look at this topic but I still don't like the crippling debt cancer treatment leaves with families. Though stealing is a strong word, I'd use copying.

It is in fact stealing, just as "copying" a song is stealing (I know the HN audience won't like that!). "Copying" software is stealing it. Using a euphamism to alleviate your guilt regarding a crime is just self delusion. And I realize this is a difficult subject, and I myself lost a brother to cancer, but the fact is that stealing actually hurts cancer victims in the long run. You might help a few cancer victims right now with some cheaper pills, but what about the thousands or millions in the future who lose out due to the lesser research. And honestly, this pharmasutical giant in India is really just looking at a new way to make money and get some great press. And it's obviously working.
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