[tsimionescu]

One thing that doesn't often get appreciated in such discussions is that there are a lot of drugs that seem promising at first, but fizzle out in larger trials. If drug companies had a known pathway to go from positive initial results to very expedited approval, even for limited cases, you can be absolutely sure that they would game the hell out of this system to sell "miracle drugs" to desperate dying patients who will pay anything for a chance.

While it's sad and horrible to know that a cure for your condition may already exist and be just out of reach, and I can imagine the despair at that, I'm not convinced the alternative is all that more appealing.

I would also note that it's certainly not, by any stretch, the worse injustice in the medical system. For every one patient with a terrible cancer that might have survived if allowed access to an experimental treatment, there are millions of people dying of easily treatable diseases for which we have had a treatment for the last hundred years, but who can't afford it.

The existence of a cure for your condition that you just can't access for whatever reason is a reality of our system. Caution in introducing new drugs is actually one of the more rational reasons, that one needs to try to come to terms with.

[collyw]

Got to remember that there is a great financial incentive for trials to come out positive. Who pays for clinical trials?