Replies to post #304064 on Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[lee kramer]

Hi osprey: I commend you for saying, "You have 50 people in a deserted island." Most people say, "DESERT island." You really can't find an island in a desert. I know, I've looked. Moses too, and look what happened to him!

[osprey]

There is much to criticize about medicine and pharma, especially big pharma dinosaurs. We all know what happened to the dinosaurs. Still it is not all bad. The life span of a US citizen is roughly 74 male, 78 female. Last century it was probably around 50. In some of the world today it is actually a lot less than 50 years.

Anyone over 18 is free to toss the medicine cabinent contents, tear up the HMO card, and diligently avoid the health care system. Just don't plan on living all that long.

[langostino]

osprey - funny you should mention cannibalism

In addition to the form you mentioned (big companies with deteriorating pipelines swallowing up smaller companies with more promising pipelines), there is another one -- companies deciding it pays more to simply sell more compounds into the same space, just varying them by a little, and focusing on marketing and advertising to stimulate demand. Easier to raid a known pot of gold from the next-door neighbor than go down panning on the river.

More importantly, this is where more and more R&D money is being diverted. Given the way these companies have shrunk their true R&D investment, it's no wonder their pipelines are shrinking.

I'd like to put an asterisk on your statement that "drugs have become harder to find" -- and say that drugs have been harder to find using the same 30 year old discovery and development techniques, and harder to find in the same focus areas that have been "mined" for the past 50 years.

Part of the problem here, is that these companies don't want to step out and do what they once did.

We've got major problems coming down the pike on bacterial infections and with basic anti-biotics. It's sickening to see the corruption of these companies grown fat, lazy and afraid, actually doing their best to cover up these serious public health issues and challenges because they'd rather just knock off each other's latest relatively inconsequential allergy medicines.

[Newly2b]

Agree with what you say, osprey. In Europe, medicine is practiced much differently, the theory being different I suppose. Personally, I look to gene therapy as replacing big pharma in this century. Unfortunately, probably too late to do ME personally much good. Here in California we have the issue of stem-cell research on the ballot in the next election. I expect it to pass, but a very Catholic friend of mine is anti, so it may fall out along religious lines, and having a lot of immigrants from Mexico here, who are Catholic, it may not pass. We'll see.

Newly