Elizabeth Rosenthal in NYT on the costs of a vaccine and what Congress has allowed in its deference to the Drug Industry...(We fought the wrong drug war, we went after the low-hanging fruit while allowing the real drug pushers, Drug Companies, to gain monopolies...
Now we are looking for viral deliverance when drug development is one of the world’s most lucrative businesses, ownership of drug patents is disputed in endless court battles, ...
That feels particularly galling for treatments and vaccines against Covid-19, whose development and production is being subsidized and incentivized with billions in federal investment.
The federal government could, for example, invoke a never-before-used power called “march-in rights,” through which it can override a patent holder’s rights if it doesn’t make its medicines “available to the public on reasonable terms.”
(Unfortunately, in already-signed agreements with Barda, some drug makers have explicitly watered down or eliminated that proviso.)
Drug companies deserve a reasonable profit for taking on this urgent task of creating a Covid-19 vaccine. But we deserve a return, too.
So before these invaluable vaccines hit the market, we should talk about an actual price. Otherwise we will be stuck paying dearly for shots that the rest of the world will get for much less.
If us USAians were told that we were *subsidizing* the rest of the world's low prices I bet people would care.
Not that that's really true, just mentioning what would get people riled up.
I suspect "reasonable profit" means something very different to most of us than to, oh, say, someone like Martin Shkreli.
@Madken65
Personally, in urgent cases like this, I think the US should have a negotiated "cooperation" pact with other nations that allows the US to pay for (reasonable) development, testing, and production ramp up, let the drug price be dirt cheap, then partner countries pay a portion of the the dev/prod costs back to the US. So the world pays for the drug and all can afford it.
and monopoly power often lets manufacturers set any price, no matter how extraordinary. A new cancer treatment can cost a half-million dollars and old staples like insulin have risen manifold in price to thousands of dollars annually.
Every other developed country has evolved schemes to set or negotiate prices, while balancing cost, efficacy and social good. The United States instead has let business calculations drive drug price tags, forcing us to accept and absorb ever higher costs.