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by nwiswell 1630 days ago
> I think we are seeing the same thing, a system designed to remove corruption/regulatory capture/lobbying as far as possible from the process

Not really. It's more like a system to selectively remove intellectual property rights without destroying the financial incentive to develop drugs.
1 comments
notch656a 1630 days ago
Oh. So you don't want a system that removes corruption, regulatory capture, and lobbying as far as possible? I don't want to destroy the financial incentive either, I think it's great people that bring wanted goods to market profit from it.

IP is an interesting point, although I'm not convinced that generating the IP is more than a small fraction of the cost of a drug. An aggregate I saw from 2011-2018 puts Research at only 17% of revenue, and only some proportion of that is geared towards generating IP. That is to say, with all else removed you could generate an IP only company for 17% the cost of drug sales.

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nwiswell 1630 days ago
> Oh. So you don't want a system that removes corruption, regulatory capture, and lobbying as far as possible?

Well, sure. But that's not what this is actually about. The titular anarchists are not inventing new drugs, they're finding alternative ways to get drugs that have already been invented.

> That is to say, with all else removed you could generate an IP only company for 17% the cost of drug sales.

I am not convinced that accurately reflects the reality of running a pharmaceutical business, even if incentives/competition is somewhat warped in healthcare. There are a lot of penny-stock pharma companies whose only mission is to generate valuable IP. They're notorious for being volatile (since their outcome is basically binary on the results of research), but not for being great investments. If what you are asserting was actually true, those sorts of firms would generate ~5x higher returns, on average.

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notch656a 1630 days ago
>Well, sure. But that's not what this is actually about. The titular anarchists are not inventing new drugs, they're finding alternative ways to get drugs that have already been invented.

... yes and they're doing so because in part regulatory capture, lobbying, and corruption have lead to unaffordable drugs. So that is, partially, what this is actually about. But sure there are other reasons for people to manufacture their own drugs outside of formal channels.

>I am not convinced that accurately reflects the reality of running a pharmaceutical business, even if incentives/competition is somewhat warped in healthcare. There are a lot of penny-stock pharma companies whose only mission is to generate valuable IP. They're notorious for being volatile (since their outcome is basically binary on the results of research), but not for being great investments. If what you are asserting was actually true, those sorts of firms would generate ~5x higher returns, on average.

That's actually my point. Generating the IP looks to be low value compared to wading through all the insane regulatory barriers, developing sales channels in-bred with medical board licensed doctors and FDA regulators that examine sales materials, lobbying for regulatory capture and all the other expensive pursuits that arguably may not add much value to the ill person consuming the drug. Another words, I'm not sure removing IP from the equation really changes the cost of drugs that much.

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