Pfizer loses nearly a BILLION dollars on drug R&D

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

What should someone do if they can't afford their cancer medication? Go back to school and try to get a better job?

Would that treatment exist if America had a socialist system as being suggested? Likely not and future medications and treatments would also not exist. Not just for America, but the world.

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

by the way, for those who are against government intervention to make medicines cheaper, how do you reconcile that with the fact that, if not for the government, companies wouldn't be able to charge a lot for these medicines in the first place? if it weren't for the government granting them a monopoly, you'd have generic companies making and selling the same thing without the huge mark up.

Do you have a solution other than allowing any person to start mixing chemicals and doing studies on humans or a socialist system that would degrade our medical treatment studies and future treatments by more than half overnight as well as cause thousands of Americans to lose their jobs and billions of dollars being removed from our economy?

There's a reason we have health insurance and there's a reason it's unaffordable for so many people. Hint.. it's not being helped by government intervention and liberal health care policies.

[SpicyMcVoodoo]

Originally Posted by JaJae

Do you have a solution other than allowing any person to start mixing chemicals and doing studies on humans or a socialist system that would degrade our medical treatment studies and future treatments by more than half overnight as well as cause thousands of Americans to lose their jobs?

what if we, as an experiment, had a federal lab that ran concurrently with the private system we have now? in 10 years, we take a look and see how it's panning out. if it's an abject failure, then we know for sure the private system is the best way to go. if it has a bunch of break throughs not found in the private system, then we know it might be something to pursue further.

has this ever been tried?

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

r.

has this ever been tried?

Yes, in socialist countries. How many medical breakthroughs do they have?

[Scrum]

Originally Posted by JaJae

Would that treatment exist if America had a socialist system as being suggested? Likely not and future medications and treatments would also not exist. Not just for America, but the world.

I'm sure the people who are dying because they cannot afford medication, and their families, are comforted by that fact.

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

I'm sure the people who are dying because they cannot afford medication, and their families, are comforted by that fact.

You're completely ignoring the fact that nobody would be cured or medicated had we not had the system in place. In other words you're for cutting medical research in half because of the minority of people who might be medicated through a socialist arrangement. Thus, supporting the future deaths of unimaginable proportions due to lost medical research. You're essentially saying we should give up on any promise of cancer, aids, stem cells etc research because some people who can't afford certain medications won't be comforted by the fact that countless other lives can be saved and knowing that one day the treatments will be available to basically everyone of the world in a cost effective manner.

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

anyone can make or sell food. if someone charges 200 for an apple, the consumer can easily go elsewhere for the same apple at a cheaper price. if phizer wants 200 a pill for some life saving medicine, the person either forks over the money or dies. hardly comparable situations.

other companies can spend the money on R&D on develop another similar drug

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

by the way, for those who are against government intervention to make medicines cheaper, how do you reconcile that with the fact that, if not for the government, companies wouldn't be able to charge a lot for these medicines in the first place? if it weren't for the government granting them a monopoly, you'd have generic companies making and selling the same thing without the huge mark up.

yes, i understand that without the patent there'd be no incentive to do the R&D, but nonetheless, that's not the free market at work. that's the government which has created a monopoly for drug companies. is it so unreasonable to think that the government, in creating those monopolies, has gone a little overboard and put too much power in their hands?

who knows...maybe this whole drug R&D business is better handled by the government. wait, hold on...couldn't the government offer incentives? like paying a shitload to some of the best talent in America? Offering huge bonuses to teams who discover things, etc.? i dunno if this is realistic...just thinking out loud.

IP law is one of foundations of capitalism, without there would be no cancer drugs

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

What should someone do if they can't afford their cancer medication? Go back to school and try to get a better job?

hope for the best but probably die from cancer

[SpicyMcVoodoo]

Originally Posted by JaJae

Yes, in socialist countries. How many medical breakthroughs do they have?

the ussr had plenty of scientific breakthroughs. as to how many drugs breakthoroughs specifically they had, I have no idea. but if they can develop a nuclear bomb and send a man into space, i don't see why they can't develop a cholesterol pill. and that was all while their economy was collapsing in on itself. what if they had the funding of the US economy behind them? i don't see why you're dismissing it prematurely.

[SpicyMcVoodoo]

Originally Posted by kinggovernor

IP law is one of foundations of capitalism, without there would be no cancer drugs

yeah, but we're completely making it up as we go along. for example, the length of time drugs are protected until generics come in is not ordained by god. it's the product of politics (special interests protecting profit).

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

yeah, but we're completely making it up as we go along. for example, the length of time drugs are protected until generics come in is not ordained by god. it's the product of politics (special interests protecting profit).

of course they are going to profit they spend billions on R&D and produce a product that is highly desirable.

[SpicyMcVoodoo]

Originally Posted by kinggovernor

of course they are going to profit they spend billions on R&D and produce a product that is highly desirable.

yes, but these companies are not altruistic. they don't look for just enough profit to cover their r&d expenses. they'll look for as much profit as they can make legal, even gouging the consumer if need be. it's a corporation. that's it's job, and whatever they've lobbied the government into doing isn't necessarily in the best interests of everyone. it may just be in the best interest of their shareholders, which aren't necessarily one in the same.

[Diesel66]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

What should someone do if they can't afford their cancer medication? Go back to school and try to get a better job?

same thing they would have done the year before the medicine was invented.

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

yes, but these companies are not altruistic. they don't look for just enough profit to cover their r&d expenses. they'll look for as much profit as they can make legal, even gouging the consumer if need be. it's a corporation. that's it's job, and whatever they've lobbied the government into doing isn't necessarily in the best interests of everyone. it may just be in the best interest of their shareholders, which aren't necessarily one in the same.

So ?

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by SpicyMcVoodoo

yes, but these companies are not altruistic. they don't look for just enough profit to cover their r&d expenses. they'll look for as much profit as they can make legal, even gouging the consumer if need be. it's a corporation. that's it's job, and whatever they've lobbied the government into doing isn't necessarily in the best interests of everyone. it may just be in the best interest of their shareholders, which aren't necessarily one in the same.

Lobbied the government? You realize that these corporations are the most regulated corporations in America. There really is no "monopoly", they get a brief patent with a drug to make back their money and then "generics" are allowed to be released where everyone else profits off their work. No other industry has that problem. And the deadline on that patent starts ticking before the decade long and expensive process of getting it approved by the FDA and moved to the public sector. All this money they're making by "gouging" is thrown right back into R&D for future developments and treatments which save more lives of the poor through liberal programs like Medicare and Medicaid which do the majority of the price gouging for not having a prescription program like the VA who work directly with the manufacturers and cut costs dramatically. Once again proving the age old rule, the more government interference and regulation the more expensive the product.

[hsmith]

Originally Posted by Scrumtralecent

What should someone do if they can't afford their cancer medication? Go back to school and try to get a better job?

without the high price there would be no incentive for the company to make the drug. then it would have never been invented.

would you rather some live and some die, or all die?

[SpicyMcVoodoo]

Originally Posted by JaJae

All this money they're making by "gouging" is thrown right back into R&D for future developments and treatments.

PFE: Income Statement for PFIZER INC - Yahoo! Finance
I see Pfizer made over 8 billion dollars last year in net profit. I'm a retard when it comes to financial statements. Does it show somewhere in here that that 8 billion is all going back into r&d?

[6SpeedTA95]

Originally Posted by nbiggershaft

I always wonderwhy this goes on, makes me much less sympathetic to drug companies.

it makes you LESS sympathetic to drug companies? that makes zero sense to me, please elaborate.

[6SpeedTA95]

Originally Posted by hsmith

without the high price there would be no incentive for the company to make the drug. then it would have never been invented.

would you rather some live and some die, or all die?

Correct.