My problem is: It's in the public interest for these drugs to exist, but how do we keep drug companies from becoming an industrial complex ala Lockheed/Boeing?
Developing drugs is very expensive. It takes years of research, most of which fails. I.e. out of the various molecules being researched, only few actually make it through all the trials and approval and get to market.
Due to the risk, investors are looking for high returns from successful drugs.
Due to that risk, the wast majority of base research aren't funded by investors. NiH funding for medical research is the single biggest researcher in the world, with a annual research budget of $26.4 billion. All that is paid double by the citizens, first through taxes and then again through insurance/drug cost.
Now imagine if we had a regulation that both forbade universities from issuing patents and limited the price of any drug that is initially based on public funded research.
Due to the risk, investors are looking for high returns from successful drugs.