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by unics 3253 days ago
In Denver there is a program that supplies hospitals internationally with expired drugs and equipment that would otherwise be without. It's been going on for decades and saved many lives.
1 comments

I'd think there's a business opportunity in recycling the still-active chemicals in those pills.
A lot of cost of drugs comes from R&D, quality control etc. The chemical synthesis itself generally isn't that expensive. And expired pills would be a quite unpredictable precursor, which isn't very desirable in the pharma industry (or anywhere else for that matter). In other words, I doubt you could make much of a profit (if any) from purifying non-decomposed chemicals from pills.
I wonder if you could get around drug patent laws with the first-sale doctrine.