SPOOFE- Your argument only holds water in the context of asprin, and other very basic drugs. Almost all drugs are manufactured in the US and other very regulated countries. And most of it is the same stuff no matter where you get it or how much you pay for it! For example, if you buy Viagra here, and then go buy Viagra in mexico, you’re still getting the same Viagra, and just as safe too. Besides which, that still doesn’t explain why it so much cheaper in Canada.
Water- Actually, it turns out you’re right on about that marketing thing. I read an article about how many companies spend more on marketing than they do on the production and research, and I thought they mentioned pharmacuetical companies in there as well. But I checked it out and it actually doesn’t mention them anywhere.
Satan- Had I known that, I wouldn’t have commented. I thought you were just talking about CDs. I didn’t realize it was a metaphor or an allegory or whatever.
Snivel, shut the fuck up. That’s not what I meant and you know it. Oh yeah, I forgot. Knowing is usually done by people with brains. Sorry, didn’t mean to make light of your handicap.
There, there. That was a gooooooooood post you did. And the other kids are only making fun of you because they’re jealous of your simplicity.
Just because the companies can sell their drugs at a certain price in Canada doesn’t mean that they can also do so in the US. While each pill should be sold for more than it cost to produce it, many of the costs, such as R&D, are independent of the number of units manufactured. They price the drug according to what the market will bear. Since the US market will bear more than anywhere else, drugs are more expensive here. Therefore we pick up a larger share of the expense for research and development.
A company does actually need to recoup more than the total costs of producing a product if it intends to produce more products. If you haven’t noticed, the production costs generally precede the sales. Therefore, in order to spend money to develop new products, there must be some extra money left over from the last product.
And I certainly am taking this seriously, as I consider it important to base government regulations on facts rather than wild speculation and rhetoric.
I said it before, and I’ll say it again. This is nothing more than political pandering intended to empower a weak minded constituency by creating even more dependence. Note the use of the term “big drug companies.” Remind you of other phrases, like “big tobacco”, “big oil”? (Notice he never mentions “big government”, your worst enemy. Which by the way, wins hands down as the most high profit industry in America.
Actually, the reason it’s cheaper there is the Canadian government buys it in bulk because they have socialized medicine. Personally, I think our medicine should be socialized as well. You can’t trust the welfare of the people in the hands of a guy who’s trying to make a buck. But that’s beside the point.
Even with that taken into account, the price they’re charging is obscene.
I think it’s the other way around. We’ll bear more, because they charge more. It’s a monopoly and they have us by the balls.
It depends on which way you cut it. You could also say that Canada is paying for R&D, while we pay for the production, with the profit dispersed between us. You could also say that we pay for the R&D and manufacturing, while everything they make from Canada is profit, or vice versa. But no matter which way you cut it, they’re still making way more profit off of us than they should.
Dude, nothing we say here makes any difference. This isn’t capitol hill. If it were I wouldn’t be able to call you a ferret felching rabbit fucker.
Does anyone know the source for this strange assertion? This is the fourth time I’ve run into this in the last few weeks, (usually accompanied by “Everybody knows that…” (which Sneevil did not say)), and I have yet to find the source for it. Given that the Weimar law was specifically targeted against various political groups, what were the groups that were named and targeted in the U.S. gun control law? (Remember, “word for word.”)
(The other variant is that the laws that Hitler got passed in 1938 to refine the Weimar laws for his list of enemies is the “word for word” source.)
The point (not the one at the top of your tiny little head) is this:
algore’s vacuous remarks have no merit and are not to be taken seriously. The statement that the drug companies, or anyone else for that matter, are making too much money is meaningless. How much is too much? In relationship to what standard? Keep in mind (oops-that doesn’t apply to you since you need a mind in which to keep something) that this country enjoys the best healthcare in the world. If part of the tradeoff is in the form of profits for pharmaceutical companies, what’s the bitch?
With the unlocking of the human genome, genetic testing for FUTURE diseases will become the norm. People will be reticent to get tests to be used by the insurance companies to deny them policies. The number of uninsured is about to explode. Doctors are already having their incomes greatly truncated by HMOs. The consumer will eventually win because there will be a single payer type nationalized healthcare system akin to Canada’s.
Any chowderhead who thinks that we live in a meritocracy; ra ra free markets invisible hand, etc., is an atavistic chunk of detritus whose sole positive attribute is that they are biodegradable. That means all of you self-centered, pampered, liposucted, SUV driving, silicone injected, baby boomers who are ruining the planet for us–the ones who will inherit this debacle. You slimy sons of bitches can’t step the fuck off fast enough.
As for the dittohead; just remember that you knuckle dragging ill-bred misogynistic pustules get more colon cancer because all you eat is white bread. No fiber, no rectum.It is not just a rule it’s a law of nature. Be sure to not inadvertantly shoot your kid when he comes home late as so many of you do. You are Fucking Pathetic.
Decent flame, Chrono. Utterly devoid of substance, of course, but this is the Pit.
Freaky, you keep saying “They’re making too much”. Prove it. As we live in a capitalist economy, the only proof that they would be making too much money would be if consumers stop buying their products. After all, the pharmaceutical companies are hardly one entity; they’re in direct competition with one another. And many of the most heavily advertised drugs (Viagra, Allegra, etc.) are ones that are hardly necessary for a person to live… unless one REALLY needs a boner at the age of 80 in order to survive.
How in the world do you know this? How much does it cost to bring one drug to market succesfully, including the research into products that didn’t pan out?
I’m interested to know what you think is a “decent” profit? Do you dispute the 17% profit margin someone mentioned before? If not, and you think 17% is “obscene”, what is an acceptable profit margin?
**
This is so ridiculous I can’t let it pass. The National Association of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers (NAPM) lists over 50 individual members. 50 different manufacturers can hardly be called a monopoly.
It seems that you are complaining about the cost of new, cutting edge drugs. Companies are given exclusive rights by the US government, the entity you want to control prices, in order to allow them to recoup their development costs and to bring new drugs to market.
Once the government sactioned period is over, other companies are free to copy the drug, and they do, vigourously. There are companies who do nothing but produce generic (meaning cheaper) versions of medicines. The cost of a generic is often 10% of the name brand price.
I think that the system we have works very well. New drugs are brought to market by companies that spend billions on research and development. In order to allow the companies to recoup these costs, the governement offers them protection for a limited time. After that, other companies are free to copy the drug. So each new drug goes through a period of relative scarcity and high prices, followed by the release of generics at dramatically lower prices.
So stop whining about “obscene profits” and propose an alternate system which would bring as many new drugs to market as the current one, while keeping prices low for established ones.
Reading through several of your posts in this thread, I have picked up a few items of interest:
You do not believe companies need prophets, er, profits.
Those who do make profits make too much.
We should all unite against them.
So, since you have shown your beliefs, and backed them up repeatedly (huh?), are you ready to LIVE your beliefs? If so, please take the following steps.
Quit your job, if you have one, because the company you work for may make a profit (even in the face of all your efforts to prevent it).
Do not buy or use products from companies that make profits. So that computer you have for internet access, which allows you to interact with this here SDMB community should go right into the trash.
DO NOT PURCHASE GROCERIES AT MAJOR FOOD CHAINS! They all make profits, dammit, and they don’t need them.
Please be certain to stop driving your car. That has all kinds of ramifications, like Auto manufacturer profits, Oil Company profits, gas station profits, it just goes on and on.
Please walk to the nearest farm, ask the farmer if you can have a small piece of his land and a few animals, and begin milking the cows in exchange. Maybe you will learn something about work, and maybe you will live happily with the chickens.
If you have done all these things, I truly commend you for living your values, rather than preaching from the soap box to the crowd, and then going home to your house/condo/apartment/mobile home built by a profitable company, watching your TV, eating your pre-packaged food, drinking…oh, you get my point.
C’mon freak, do you even think about the things you say?
In addition to charging more for certain drugs in America. Americans also support drug companies through their tax dollars. The Government routinely funds R&D for drug companies through research grants. As was the case with most of the AIDS meds currently on the market. So not only are we paying more for the drug, in a lot of cases, we also paid for a significant part of the development, through taxes.
As for advertising. Ask any nurse or doctor and they’ll tell you that meds are developed so fast that it’s a fight just to keep current. That why the PDR and the drug manuals exist. When Drug companies solicit directly to the consumer, they’re pushing a new product that the doctor may not be aware of, or it’s potential interactions with other drugs.
Of course companies should make a profit. I just meant that profits aren’t needed to keep a company running. Profits are what happen after you take all those expenses out. But that doesn’t mean companies shouldn’t make a profit. And I never suggested they shouldn’t. But something’s fishy, and the scenario reeks of price-fixing. And something needs to be done about it.
The fact that our dear Mr. Gore made drug companies out to be a bad guy in an effort to win votes? The fact that drug companies still haven’t managed to cure EVERYthing yet? The fact the Viagra is a lot more of a household name than that drug cocktail that slows the deterioration caused by HIV? The fact that you’ve been unable to show any evidence for a plethora of outrageous claims that you made, apparently, in the heat of the moment?
This is quite correct, and as I said earlier, it means that there is a legitimate policy question here.
Drug companies are given monopoly rights over certain drugs, which makes their prices too high for short-term efficiency and makes certain drugs immensely profitable.
This would be a rip-off and a government-protected racket but for the fact that this encourages new and better drugs.
Whether the current degree of monopoly protection is appropriate or excessive is a matter for legitimate debate. If you think this is a non-issue, consult a health economics or public economics textbook.
Thank you! This is what we’ve been saying all along. It’s a cost vs. benefit thing, which can (and should be) the subject of legitimate debate. On the one hand, any new drug is the proprietary property of the drug company that developed it. On the other hand, should that drug company be able to charge a price so high as to make that drug out of the reach of those who need it, but cannot afford it?
I don’t know what the answer is, but the dilemma does point up freak freely’s objection to the practice. Freak does not like the profit motive, or the notion of reward for effort. You will have to admit, Freak, that without the huge profit potential, many new pharmacueticals simply would not be developed, and everyone would be the worse off for it. Freak wants to punish the drug companies. I think this is the wrong approach. It is not a development problem, it is a distribution problem.
Look, it comes down to this: The drugs, no matter which way you look at it, are ridiculously overpriced. For instance, it costs $72.76 to buy a month’s supply of prozac in the US, whereas it would cost $25.93 in Spain. A month;s supply of Clozapine, and anti-psychotic, would cost $317.03 in the US, and $51.94 in Spain. So basically, psychos are being charged $317 dollars to keep from killing our sisters and raping our dogs.
So, obviously they’re not exactly hurting for money. But many of their customers are.
So, we only have three choices:
a) We can force drug companies to lower their prices.
b) We can make it so Medicare pays for all these drugs, thus taking the money out of our pockets.
c) We can keep letting the senior citizens of our country get raped for their money.
So put that in your crack pipe and smoke it.
Oh, and to Sneevil, I still can’t believe that you like being called a dittohead. I mean, it basically means that you have no brain of your own. But I feel more contempt for you then pity.
Don’t put words in my mouth unless you want me to put my dick in yours. Maybe then you would shut the fuck up.
Problem is, they only research for the ones that would be real profitable. Do you have any idea how much money they put into finding a cure for the common cold and flu? WAY more than they put into AIDs, MS, and Altzheimer’s combined.
Once again, never said that. I don’t believe in punishment, I believe in correction. Punishment without correction is a pointless waste of time.