For those who think National Healthcare is a bad idea...

flyer said:
I've a bit of input here which might be of help, as I worked for a company that was involved in drug testing equipment for 20 years

If company A discovered the cure for the common cold, it would have to enter a period of testing to prove that the drug, amongst other tests, was stable for use across the entire world. It is well known that drugs can change their characteristics depending on what temperatures and humidities they are exposed to and therefore may become dangerous. This could mean drugs used in a temperate climate such as ours may be safe, but the same drug stored / used in tropical climates may be dangerous.

I was told that only 10% of drugs in development make it through all of the tests they have to complete before they get to market because the other 90% fail for one reason or another. Therefore the 10% of drugs that make it through to production have to recoup not only their own development costs but also the development costs of the 90% of drugs that failed somewhere along the line.

In addition to this, company A has to state how long its cure for the common cold will last in your medicine cabinet at home. Obviously company A will want it to be as long as possible especially as company B is probably working on the same cure. So a clock starts ticking and it lasts for eight years. Now, assuming you claim that you drug is safe for five years, then you have to provide test results over five years to prove your drug is safe no matter where it is used / stored throughout the world. Until you provide this proof, you will not be given a licence to sell your drug.

So. after five years of testing, you finally have a drug that you can sell and can make you loads of money. Unfortunately, that only means you have three years to 'cash in' before the licence expires. Now your drug becomes GENERIC meaning yo have to release all of the technical data so that anyone can make the drug.

Paracetamol, may have been a clever drug when it was first produced, but now you can get 100 tablets in Tesco for 20p if you see what I mean
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Very true,i used to work for a big pharma company,even in the mid 90's it was costing 250 m to bring a drug to market,as you say not many drugs make it through the testing phase,if you are the innovater it's tested a lot more and tends to be the most expensive drugs on the market,these companies are businesses not charities
 
karen7 said:
Very true,i used to work for a big pharma company,even in the mid 90's it was costing 250 m to bring a drug to market,as you say not many drugs make it through the testing phase,if you are the innovater it's tested a lot more and tends to be the most expensive drugs on the market,these companies are businesses not charities
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I remember one large project we did and the manager from the pharma company really put everybody under pressure to hit the completion dates without exception. The work when finished would be used to store a really effective new drug for breast cancer and he never stopped telling us that everyday the project over-ran, somebody else might die from the disease. It would be easy to be cynical and say that everyday missed was a day of profit lost, but I later heard some family member of his had dies from breast cancer so it really was a mission for him.

I also saw or heard quite a bit about what development work was taking place at the companies we worked with. They obviously couldn't go into great detail because of the confidential nature of their business, but there are some very clever and dedicated people working within these companies who genuinely want to find cures for our illnesses and we'd be a lot worse off without them. But like Karen7 says, ultimately they are businesses with a need to reward their investors, but that's just how the system works. And they know, if they don't come up with the solutions that keep us alive, then they know the business won't survive either. I think it's important to remember that the vast majority of their staff are focused on cures not profits
 
flyer said:
I remember one large project we did and the manager from the pharma company really put everybody under pressure to hit the completion dates without exception. The work when finished would be used to store a really effective new drug for breast cancer and he never stopped telling us that everyday the project over-ran, somebody else might die from the disease. It would be easy to be cynical and say that everyday missed was a day of profit lost, but I later heard some family member of his had dies from breast cancer so it really was a mission for him.

I also saw or heard quite a bit about what development work was taking place at the companies we worked with. They obviously couldn't go into great detail because of the confidential nature of their business, but there are some very clever and dedicated people working within these companies who genuinely want to find cures for our illnesses and we'd be a lot worse off without them. But like Karen7 says, ultimately they are businesses with a need to reward their investors, but that's just how the system works. And they know, if they don't come up with the solutions that keep us alive, then they know the business won't survive either. I think it's important to remember that the vast majority of their staff are focused on cures not profits
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Yes the scientists and brilliant people want their legacy to be they saved lives with their work,break throughs are happening all the time,they are seperate to the corprate world
 
Dentistry in the UK is a good indicator of what happens when you moneytise healthcare - I follow a guy on YT who fixes cars but last year he went abroad to get his teeth fixed. the firm My Dentist quoted just over £16k for his needs - for £3k he went to Turkey got the work done plus a follow up some time late AND that included two holidays with his Mrs......
 
bluethrunthru said:
Dentistry in the UK is a good indicator of what happens when you moneytise healthcare - I follow a guy on YT who fixes cars but last year he went abroad to get his teeth fixed. the firm My Dentist quoted just over £16k for his needs - for £3k he went to Turkey got the work done plus a follow up some time late AND that included two holidays with his Mrs......
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Poor bastard!
 
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