[ffgjgf1]

> In the US

I’m certain that the US is in no way unique in that. Countries with universal public healthcare care systems do cost-benefit analysis all the time and access to the newest effective treatment options outside of the richest/most developed countries (or even in them) is far from guaranteed. e.g good luck buying latest cancer drugs from the US on an East European salary after your local healthcare system bureaucrats have rejected them because they are too expensive and/or are taking a year or two to decide of they are worth buying.

> or if you'd been living in basically any other developed nation on Earth.

That’s just beyond absurd, unless you think that only Switzerland and a handful of other rich countries are “developed”. Yes getting some minimum/acceptable level of care when you’re not rich might generally be easier. Getting access to latest or even experimental drugs (most of which are developed in the US)? Not so much..

[kevincox]

This is partially true but for many things the price is different. In the US drugs are priced assuming that there are some number of rich people who can afford them. This often results in higher margin pricing which is more profitable even if the volume is lower and puts them out of reach of many. In countries with public health care, setting the price that high will typically result in near-zero sales, so the price gets set closet to the cost-benefit point to make profit in lower margins but higher volumes.

It doesn't always work like this. Some drugs are just too expensive to manufacture and the minimum profitable price is too high for the benefit in public health care. But often the bargaining and purchasing power of a public health care system can achieve lower prices for drugs and other tools.

[ffgjgf1]

> In countries with public health care, setting the price that high will typically result in near-zero sales,

I’m not sure that’s strictly true at least when it comes to the most expensive/newly developed drugs:

https://www.investigate-europe.eu/posts/deadly-prices-medici...

Doesn’t seem that massively different from the relationship between insurance companies and drug companies in the US.

> In countries with public health care, setting the price that high will typically result in near-zero sales

Interestingly enough it seems like the poorer Central/East European countries end up paying more than the richer ones.