Live data from Hacker News

Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

stories.gilead.com

31–40 of 114 posts

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#31
I don't really understand the outrage. Surely, the price is only too high in the event that they can't sell their product? It's a business, not a charity.

Other companies will be looking hungrily at these earnings and invest in developing their own antivirals---which is exactly the desired outcome.

Sure, it would be great to have this drug available to everyone right here, right now, for cheap. But investing on those terms is not very attractive; hence the drug simply wouldn't exist.

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#32
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How many years of normalizing and internalizing the utter insanity that is the US medical industrial complex does it take to be able to just say that with a straight face? I hate to tell you, but it's not better in Europe just because the racket is obfuscated by several more layers.

Please back up such an unlikely sounding claim with several excellent sources. Here in the UK, there is exactly one layer: the NHS. It negotiates prices directly with drug suppliers, and as the sole buyer (monopsony) is able to get a great deal. It also sets the prices paid by consumers (the prescription price), which is a flat price charged for all drugs (yes really all of them) and is currently £9.15 (about 11 USD)…

Are these drug companies British?

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#33
post #9

What this letter did not address is the fact that the US is hoarding almost all of Gilead's Remdesivir in the upcoming few months. Leaving the rest of the world with almost nothing. Source: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/30/us-buys-up-w...

Surely they patented it so it can be trivially reproduced by others outside the US, right?

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#34
post #9

What this letter did not address is the fact that the US is hoarding almost all of Gilead's Remdesivir in the upcoming few months. Leaving the rest of the world with almost nothing. Source: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/30/us-buys-up-w...

I wonder if this will indirectly lead people to start thinking about whether socialized medical systems stifle innovation and make the systems reliant on innovative "capitalist" economies.

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#35
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why they down-vote you, you didn't said anything about 'free' healthcare, and you are absolute right, the 'customer' does not see much of those layers, but ask any Healthcare-worker that has to work with insurance...they can tell you story's!

Very few people have private health care in Europe, at least in the UK - they are either comparatively very rich or have a job that provides it (again, very rare and probably a job that pays very well to begin with). You will see a lot of buying power from free health care providers as they represent tens-hundreds of millions of people - they will most likely pass on a price gouging drug in favour for others. They wo…

The most relevant industry to this board (IT) usually provide private healthcare though. I’ve had BUPA from work since I graduated. Granted this is across only two jobs but when I’ve been applying for jobs in the past private health has always been one of the perks

Maybe it’s different in the start up world but larger companies all seem to offer private health insurance.

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#36

If it is an effective treatment, tell me why we should pay $2,340 per patient, and not just invalidate their patent on the grounds of public good? The US gov partially paid for its development in the first place.

Maybe so that next time we need them, they don't just say, naahh, gonna do something instead that actually pays?

That worked so well for opioid crisis victims.

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#37
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very low, but obviously not comparable at all.

Do you have a randomized clinical trial comparing the two treatments?

There are hundreds of trials in various states of completion for hydroxychloroquine [1]. At least 10 of them specifically call out using it in combination with zinc, though some completed trials that don't specifically call it out in the title also used zinc if you read the papers.

There are about 35 trials in various states of completion of remdesivir [2].

If hydroxychloroquine actually does anything, we'll eventually find out. But the cold hard truth is that all the evidence so far is that remdesivir is a weakly effective treatment (shortens length of stay in hospital slightly, not a miracle cure) while hydroxychloroquine hasn't been shown to do much of anything useful in COVID. Both aren't as big a deal as Dexamethasone, which significantly reduces mortality in the sickest patients.

Most facilities have settled on using remdesivir + dexamethasone as the standard treatment for the sickest patients and have totally ditched hydroxychloroquine. Many are still administering zinc and other low-risk treatments like vitamin C and D to patients because while the evidence isn't there, there's no cost or safety reason not to try it.

The problem with talking about hydroxychloroquine is that it has become the rallying cry of the conspiracy theorist, so any talk about it results in someone saying you are "testing it wrong". The most common response is "it is a preventative treatment, not a treatment of already sick people! they are testing the wrong patients in trials!" or "it only works in combination with zinc!" or whatever. The good news is all those combinations are being trialed and if it actually does anything, we'll eventually find out. Whether anyone ever comes up with evidence that hydroxychloroquine does anything useful in COVID patients, it will definitely be one of the most studied drugs ever.

[1] https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results?cond=covid&term=hydro...

[2] https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/results?cond=covid&term=remde...

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#38

American taxpayers contributed at least $70m to the development of this drug[0] and our reward is to be gouged by Gilead. It's the exact same shit they've pulled with Truvada[1] and it's grotesque. [0]: https://www.citizen.org/article/the-real-story-of-remdesivir... [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/16/opinion/prep-hiv-aids-dru...

It typically costs ~$2B to develop a new drug. Taxpayer contributions are practically negligible.

Has anyone checked the $2B or is this what pharma tells?

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#39
Indian companies have already started manufacturing Remdesivir (under license from Gilead) and selling them at a price of ~$70.

I wonder how other countries are going to respond since the US seems to have bought up the entire global stockpile from Gilead (who are charging $390 - $520 to Americans).

[1] https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/india-s-hetero-pri...

[2] https://www.indiatvnews.com/business/news-covid19-drug-cipre...

Re: Open Letter from Gilead CEO: Remdesivir Pricing

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please back up such an unlikely sounding claim with several excellent sources. Here in the UK, there is exactly one layer: the NHS. It negotiates prices directly with drug suppliers, and as the sole buyer (monopsony) is able to get a great deal. It also sets the prices paid by consumers (the prescription price), which is a flat price charged for all drugs (yes really all of them) and is currently £9.15 (about 11 USD)…

Are these drug companies British?

Some. American drugs companies too, though. They want our bargaining power to be mediated by the coming UKUSA trade agreement so we have to pay through the nose like Americans do. At the moment they either sell to us or lose out on our custom (the NHS is not above refusing to buy a drug on expense grounds). They're trying to make this impossible for us to do by levering political power, because single payer healthcare doesn't permit them to abuse their market power over here.
Post reply on HN