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Cancer Drug May Not Get A Chance Due to Lack of Patent
theshowmecanuck writes to mention that in a recent study, researchers at the University of Alberta Department of Medicine have shown that an existing small, relatively non-toxic molecule, dichloroacetate (DCA), causes regression in several different cancers. From the article: "But there's a catch: the drug isn't patented, and pharmaceutical companies may not be interested in funding further research if the treatment won't make them a profit. In findings that 'astounded' the researchers, the molecule known as DCA was shown to shrink lung, breast and brain tumors in both animal and human tissue experiments."
Cancer Drug May Not Get A Chance Due to Lack of Patent
Note the word "may".
But because it's not patented or owned by any drug firm, it would be an inexpensive drug to administer. And researchers may have a difficult time finding money for further research.
Speculation.
Dr. Dario Altieri, of the University of Massachusetts, said the drug is exactly what doctors need because it could limit side-effects for patients. But there are "market considerations" that drug companies would have to take into account.
Buesiness fact.
Michelakis remains hopeful he will be able to secure funding for further research.
As anybody would.
"We hope we can attract the interest of universities here in Canada and in the United States," said Michelakis.
Excellent.
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The only news here is the drug itself and how things are moving along well. Yet, a speculation is reported as the main factor, when there is no supporting information for it. Did they even ask for funding yet? The researchers are taking the market into consideration, and the reporter seems to want to make a big deal out of it.
Even if the pharmaceutical companies do turn it down, and even if they do turn it down on the basis of no profit, it just means that the researches will have to do more presentation to find funding. If there is obvious promise in this (which there's have to be to get a pharmaceutical company to invest loads of cash) some organization, or college, or government grant will help pay for the studies.
Have you read my journal today?
here
-mcgrew (my computer is broken):
Re:Am I missing something?
Yes.
It's not that people wouldn't pay; it's that without a patent, there's no protection for the manufacturer. Company A pays for the R&D on the drug, and then they go through years of clinical trials to clear the regulatory agencies. This costs $100mm to $1bln for most drugs. If there's no patent protection, Companies B through H can produce generic equivalents, prove equivalency to the regulators (at a cost of a few 10s of millions), and then undercut company A on price.
In the short run this appears to benefit the consumer. In reality however, Company A is too smart to give a free ride to their competitors. The drug never gets developed and more people die.
It's not just their lack of expertise. Getting a drug through level 3 trials is expensive: it takes a lot of (often paid) subjects, and doctors and nurses to spend time with those subjects, and a battery of tests to be done on those subjects. This money is spent over years to ensure that the pill is safe and effective before you have even a single paying patient. Paying the subjects is actually the cheap part.
And there's the possibility that once they've spent all that money, it could fail. Maybe the pill just doesn't work. Maybe there are side effects: look at the way Merck is getting hammered for producing a highly effective pill (Vioxx) that just happened, to, well, kill a few people.
Barr makes their money by letting somebody else pay for all that, and then coming in a few years later and charging a lot less. It's the usual problem: the second pill costs $.49, but the first pill costs $75,000,000.
Even if the companies do turn it down they will get a further crack at it. Courtesy of the Byah-Dole act most publicly funded research (especially drug research) in the U.S. can later be "bought" by private companies who may then claim "intellectual property" on the fruits of the public's labors. It is this law that allows both AZT and Viagra (developed with funding from the National Institutes of Health) to be considered "private" property and for the companies to charge the people who invested in their development for their use.
The practical upshot of this is that if the drug does go to the universities to be developed it would be following the normal track of most medical research. And if any patentability (say on dosage levels) does show up the companies can always buy it then.
Cuba has a large, thriving and internationally recognized cutting-edge pharmaceutical and biomedical research industry. They specialize in developing and distributing drugs to the 99% of planet Earth that can't afford $5/day to get harder erections. They generally research based on the commonality and severity of particular diseases, and then try to find exceptionally low-cost ways to solve them better. Ironically enough, it's quite profitable since selling tens of millions of pills to entire continents at 1% profit can add up pretty quickly.
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
I *STILL* have cancer to this day because of the bullcrap like this.
IMHO as a cancer patient, the reason why there's no 'cure' to different types of diseases (including diabetes) is because the pharmaceutical companies make billions of dollars a year keeping us sick. If there was a cure, there goes their profits.
I would like to see a law passed that says that if a cure if found and not distributed within a viable time frame to the general public (lets say 10 years), the company can be charged with genocide.
Will it happen? Hell no. There's too many people in power in Washington who owns stocks in these companies.
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage many vary...
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
It's not a broken system. On my local news (Edmonton, home of the UofA) they are specifically NOT including drug companies in funding the trials, because they want the drug to be cheap.
FTA:
"A small, non-toxic molecule may soon be available as an inexpensive treatment for many forms of cancer, including lung, breast and brain tumours, say University of Alberta researchers."
Sir Frederick Banting, (another Canadian) did the same thing with his patent for Insulin, so that drug companies would never have a monopoly on something needed for people to live.
"History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme." Mark Twain
How in the world is this insightful? You are recommending to people who have no clue what the consequences of just going out and taking some medication might be to give it a whirl since it isn't a controlled substance. Regardless of how we would all love to find out that you could just go to the grocery and grab a bottle of "No More Cancer," suggesting that people experiment on themselves is NOT a reasonable suggestion. Science is not the culmination of anecdotal evidence, just because it worked for someone does not mean it will work for you nor that what you think happened is actually what happened (e.g. just because you no longer have cancer after giving it a try doesn't mean that it was what caused the remission) Giving out advice as you have should be done with great care which you have not displayed.
...where we believe that governments have a responsibility to set policy for, and even fund, public health initiatives that are not necessarily advantageous to any given industry sector or corporation.
The research in question was funded by a Canadian federal government agency, and I'm certain that one or two well-funded, non-profit and/or public sector agencies will step up to the plate to study whether the proposed treatment is safe, and if so, some smart non-intellectual-property-driven and yet profitable organization will market it.
The people are willing, but our governments are not.
I have long argued that the drug companies should be sidelined in favour of public money ( and lots of it ) being invested into medical research, with the benefits enjoyed by all. The problem is that the pharmecutical industry is incredibly powerful ( and rich ), and prevent our governments from performing any public research, insisting that the 'market will provide'. This story points out the bullshit level in this case. The market does not provide anything for society other than those things which make the most profits for market players. If we want the best possible medical technology, and for it to be accessible by all people and not just those with the cash, then we need to have massive public investment, and also consider specifically excluding medical technology from patent law.
Actually, if you read the article (I know bizarre), you would have know that it is already and FDA approved drug and is actively prescribed. It has some side effects but nothing horrible. Since it is already approved, getting it cleared for use in a an additional capacity is much easier since it has been proven safe for human use. The only thing that needs to be proved is effecacy.
Sorry my bullshit sensor overloaded.
Perhaps Health Insurance Companies could fund this type of research - they would stand to benefit directly due to the high costs associated with cancer treatment.
You had me at merlot