Those were also small molecule drugs which are relatively simple to produce compared to modern large molecule drugs (biologics such as modern insulin, mrna vaccines, humira, many cancer drugs, etc.)
You might be surprised that the modern processes for true biologicals like peptides and mRNA are actually simpler than the chemical processes for classic drugs. E.g. solid state peptide synthesis. Once you can make a 10 peptide one, you can make a 1000 unit one in an identical way with more iteration.
Compare that to establishing a bespoke chemical process for each drug, or messing with purification of natural biologicals, or fusing antibodies to protein or peptides to grow inside a whole cell.
They should be actually cheap. They aren't because new.
Humira is quite a bit harder to manufacture cleanly than a peptide or mRNA, and still harder than a plain solid state synthesized and folded protein. It requires a lot of post translational modification, which means cellular machinery, which means a whole bacterial cell you now have to grow, feed and remove from the product.
Compare that to establishing a bespoke chemical process for each drug, or messing with purification of natural biologicals, or fusing antibodies to protein or peptides to grow inside a whole cell.
They should be actually cheap. They aren't because new.
Humira is quite a bit harder to manufacture cleanly than a peptide or mRNA, and still harder than a plain solid state synthesized and folded protein. It requires a lot of post translational modification, which means cellular machinery, which means a whole bacterial cell you now have to grow, feed and remove from the product.