People spend their time and resources developing drugs because they know that the patent system provides them an opportunity to earn a return. If drug patents weren’t enforced, GLP-1 would have never been developed. We could rug-pull the particular companies who own GLP-1 patents by removing patent protection after the fact, that would work to improve access to these particular drugs. But then the next lifesaving drugs won’t be developed, because there will be no prospect for a return.
Similar to how doctors save lives and earn a paycheck. We could stop paying doctors, enslave them to work 18 hours 7 days a week so more people get medical care. On top of being obviously evil and wrong, it would also be counterproductive, because then nobody would become a doctor.
Put simply, drugs cost money because money is how we direct resources as a society. There is not a cheat code where we can simply make the drugs free and still expect resources to magically appear and manifest the drugs. The drugs exist because we pay for them.
I share the feeling that it’s awful that people are blocked from access to these lifesaving drugs by money. But simply eliminating patent protection is not a workable solution. It needs to be accompanied by a replacement mechanism to incentivize drug development. For example, government gives out massive prizes to the drug developer but there is no patent protection.