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Drug Firm Offers $1 Version of $750 Daraprim Pill (chicagotribune.com)
An anonymous reader writes: We recently read about a U.S. company that bought the rights to a drug called Daraprim and then boosted the price over 5,000%. There was widespread outrage over this blatant price gouging, most of it focused on hedge fund manager Martin Shkreli. Now, a San Diego-based drug company called Imprimis has stepped in to fill the void. They announced that they'll be supplying capsules containing the same active ingredients in Daraprim for $1 per dose. Their CEO, Mark Baum, said they'll also start making alternative versions of other generic medicines that have skyrocketed in price lately. "Imprimis, which primarily makes compounded drugs to treat cataracts and urological conditions, will work with health insurers and prescription benefit managers in each state to make its new capsules and other compounded generic medicines widely available, Baum said."
This guy is a multiple-time asshole
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
He didn't go on TV to "brag" about it until the Internet got ahold of the story. And I wouldn't call it bragging -- he seemed (to me when I saw the story) to think in his own twisted mind that this was a greatest good argument -- that him making lots of money off of other people's lives would somehow help his business help other people. Bragging would be if he thought he was getting away with evil. He seemed to think he wasn't. He's still evil, but not inside his own head.
The angel company is a new startup that is trying to break into the market, and this is cheap advertising for them, even though they're going to lose money on the pills at that rate. It's a brilliant move, and an example of why you can only push a monopoly position so far before someone will find a way to undercut you.
Long and short of it: I don't think there's any conspiracy here.
No, I don't think it's odd, considering that the price of the pill was originally $13 each. If one person were pulling the strings at both companies, it would be absolutely idiotic to hike the price just so they can eventually *cut* the price to less than a 10th of the original cost.
I wonder though... at a dollar a pill... when you compare it to 750, it seems insanely tiny. But look at your bottle of ibuprofin, at $13 for 1,000 capsules, you see that even at a buck a pill they are still easily able to stay in the black.
I realize not every pill has the same manufacturing cost, but they are at least within an order of magnutude of each other for the most part. At a buck a pill, that bottle above would be $1,000. It's $13, and they're still making a margin off it. I'd be surprised if this $750 drug costs over 76 times as much to manufacture in quantity as another drug.
They're trying to recoup an R&D lost. I get that. That's OK. But they've had years to do that. That's precisely why we have patents. But when your time is up, that knowledge is transferred to the public. It's up to you as a developer to use your time wisely and recoup your investment and reap a reward for your innovation. But then you have to give it up. If you still don't feel you've managed to get enough back out of the system by that point, then you're doing something wrong, and have no one to blame but yourself.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
It's usually not the manufacturing that is so expensive but the research and testing needing to get the drug on the market. In this case neither company needs to do any research or additional testing with the FDA since the drug is well known and has been on the market for 60 years. That doesn't apply with a brand new drug which may have to go through years of testing even if the first version is perfect with no side effects.
The two drug combo tablet, Pyrimethamine 25mg + Sulfadoxine 500mg, has many generic suppliers in India, for under 4 cents a tablet, with a lot more sulfa drug added in. The aseptic pilling and blister packaging probably cost more than the pyrimethamine at 1 cent.
$13.50 per tablet of 25 mg pyrimethamine was a joke and an utter ripoff. The $750 makes the French Revolution more understandable when they started shortening corrupt financiers and government royalists after a short trial...Sort of a closer shave with that super sized Gillete thing.
No he's not, LEARN TO READ ffs.
When Chevy says that they're truck
He's saying that you shouldn't believe someone who says they are a truck. They are LYING to you, they are actually just a person in a truck outfit.
If it's in you sig, it's in your post.
Part of the problem here is that the FDA requires generics do need to undergo testing similar to the original product (instead of merely proving that the ingredients in the generic are the same as in the original product), which can take years and millions of dollars. These FDA requirements make generics expensive to produce -- meaning that generic versions of many drugs do not exist. Without the FDA requirements, the market would take care of ridiculous price bumps by bringing in competitors.
Now, I just claimed that the FDA makes it hard to bring generics to the market, so how did a competitor spring up so quickly in this case? The answer is that the new manufacture seriously bent FDA rules: the product mentioned in the description is _not_ FDA approved. The company making the product is not a standard drug manufacturer; it is a "compounding pharmacy" -- meaning that it can skirt FDA rules by making batches of drugs for one individual at a time (not making huge batches and selling them to Wallgreen's, CVS, etc.) Since this drug is not widely used, this approach may work. However, the FDA regulations are still a burden in general (and the FDA still has some power to put the kibosh on compounding pharmacy).
See http://marginalrevolution.com/... for more information