Poverty in the US

[G-spotter]

Cheap

[jon]

 

Insurance industry, not Big Pharma. Big Pharma is in the toilette right now - massive layoffs, no new drugs to speak of. Why? About 15 years ago sales and marketing folks took over the industry and 'ran it like a business'.

 

They forgot the science/R&D part. Furthermore, they began to cook the books on their studies. Hyjinks ensued. Now they're soundly fucked.

 

That's not really the problem. Biotech is fueled by investment. It's risky but with a blockbuster very lucrative for a long-term investor. During the dot com days tons of money flooded the biotech market with big hopes from the human genome project, lots of people got rich, and you know the story lots of people got killed in the aftermath. It has not recovered since. Part of it is due to people really getting burned. CTI, which at one point was the highest valued company in the world, has burned through several billion dollars in cash and has never had a drug approved. In the end though, the high risk money went somewhere else, into more dot coms and then into real estate, something that would fail or succeed quicker. I don't see the money returning without some fundamental changes.

 

What needs to change? The drug approval process needs to be modernized. Certain classes of the newer designer therapies that are not chemotherapeutics (ie immuno and cell based therapies) need to be strictly excluded from any potential liabilities that are not the result of gross negligence. I'm sure many read the NYT article yesterday about a new therapy for CLL. While R&D is expensive, the approval process contains the bulk of the cost. That needs to be stripped away with a strict opt in process ie you will die without this therapy if it kills you that is the risk YOU took. That would provide access to experimental therapies quicker to the thousands being diagnosed with untreatable diseases every day. Let's be honest, many of these new therapies, including the one quoted in the NYT articles and Provenge, is really a couple days of lab work that isn't very expensive.

[E-rock]

i always wanted to live in a lost decade

 

a decade of decadence?

hemingway made it sound so bitch'n!

 

Just finished The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald didn't.

[JayB]

 

Insurance industry, not Big Pharma. Big Pharma is in the toilette right now - massive layoffs, no new drugs to speak of. Why? About 15 years ago sales and marketing folks took over the industry and 'ran it like a business'.

 

They forgot the science/R&D part. Furthermore, they began to cook the books on their studies. Hyjinks ensued. Now they're soundly fucked.

 

That's not really the problem. Biotech is fueled by investment. It's risky but with a blockbuster very lucrative for a long-term investor. During the dot com days tons of money flooded the biotech market with big hopes from the human genome project, lots of people got rich, and you know the story lots of people got killed in the aftermath. It has not recovered since. Part of it is due to people really getting burned. CTI, which at one point was the highest valued company in the world, has burned through several billion dollars in cash and has never had a drug approved. In the end though, the high risk money went somewhere else, into more dot coms and then into real estate, something that would fail or succeed quicker. I don't see the money returning without some fundamental changes.

 

What needs to change? The drug approval process needs to be modernized. Certain classes of the newer designer therapies that are not chemotherapeutics (ie immuno and cell based therapies) need to be strictly excluded from any potential liabilities that are not the result of gross negligence. I'm sure many read the NYT article yesterday about a new therapy for CLL. While R&D is expensive, the approval process contains the bulk of the cost. That needs to be stripped away with a strict opt in process ie you will die without this therapy if it kills you that is the risk YOU took. That would provide access to experimental therapies quicker to the thousands being diagnosed with untreatable diseases every day. Let's be honest, many of these new therapies, including the one quoted in the NYT articles and Provenge, is really a couple days of lab work that isn't very expensive.

 

Spot.On.

[Buckaroo]

Buckshot is living in opposite world, the one portrayed by Faux news for the benefit of the intellectually challenged.

 

the rich are getting richer and the dumb are getting dumber

 

""Its odd how the same people who hate the pharmaceutical industry also want free medicine from the government.""

 

I wouldn't take that crap if you paid me. Pharmaceuticals kill more people than illicit drugs.

 

""Do we want big pharm companies inventing medicine for our government to give to us for free or not?""

 

actually a majority of research is paid for with tax dollars. Also the bush boy passed laws that say Medicare can't bargain with the Pharma companies.

 

""Or is it more of the "F#$k all corporations" mantra we hear?""

 

hearing on Faux news and reality are two different things. The reality is the corps are screwing the working class, worse than ever before in history.

 

""Will a democracy only last until the people realize they can vote themselves money out of the state treasury?""

 

No it only lasts until the bankers and CEO's buy the politicians and together rob the treasury which they are currently in the process of doing thanks to the bush boy and Obama.

 

[G-spotter]

 

Insurance industry, not Big Pharma. Big Pharma is in the toilette right now - massive layoffs, no new drugs to speak of. Why? About 15 years ago sales and marketing folks took over the industry and 'ran it like a business'.

 

They forgot the science/R&D part. Furthermore, they began to cook the books on their studies. Hyjinks ensued. Now they're soundly fucked.

 

That's not really the problem. Biotech is fueled by investment. It's risky but with a blockbuster very lucrative for a long-term investor. During the dot com days tons of money flooded the biotech market with big hopes from the human genome project, lots of people got rich, and you know the story lots of people got killed in the aftermath. It has not recovered since. Part of it is due to people really getting burned. CTI, which at one point was the highest valued company in the world, has burned through several billion dollars in cash and has never had a drug approved. In the end though, the high risk money went somewhere else, into more dot coms and then into real estate, something that would fail or succeed quicker. I don't see the money returning without some fundamental changes.

 

What needs to change? The drug approval process needs to be modernized. Certain classes of the newer designer therapies that are not chemotherapeutics (ie immuno and cell based therapies) need to be strictly excluded from any potential liabilities that are not the result of gross negligence. I'm sure many read the NYT article yesterday about a new therapy for CLL. While R&D is expensive, the approval process contains the bulk of the cost. That needs to be stripped away with a strict opt in process ie you will die without this therapy if it kills you that is the risk YOU took. That would provide access to experimental therapies quicker to the thousands being diagnosed with untreatable diseases every day. Let's be honest, many of these new therapies, including the one quoted in the NYT articles and Provenge, is really a couple days of lab work that isn't very expensive.

 

http://healthresearchpolicy.org/assessments/patent-pools-assessing-their-value-added-global-health-innovation-and-access

[j_b]

"they aren't really poor once you factor in they get food stamps"