Yes, fix the patent system

Posted Apr 26, 2011 15:32 UTC (Tue) by cowsandmilk (guest, #55475)
In reply to: Yes, fix the patent system by tterribe
Parent article: A victory for the trolls

Universities (where most of this "federal funding" occurs) only originate 24% of pharmaceuticals, and trust me, the amount they're spending pales in comparison to what drug companies spend. See http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2010/11/04/where_dru... for a pointer to where drugs come from.

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Yes, fix the patent system

Posted Apr 26, 2011 19:22 UTC (Tue) by b7j0c (guest, #27559) [Link] (1 responses)

that is because universities don't fund drugs to give old people boners or make sad housewives more interested in smiling.

the biotech industry pushes more mood altering/lifestyle pills than that guy on the corner

Yes, fix the patent system

Posted Apr 26, 2011 22:10 UTC (Tue) by rahvin (guest, #16953) [Link]

Drug companies also push a significant amount of research into very serious conditions that rob people of their lives. Government does very little research into arthritis (and it's many variants including Rheumatoid) compared to the private sector. The major drug companies are spending billions every year trying to discover the cause and treatment for these conditions because they are extremely lucrative due to the damage they reap on a persons life. People will literally sell their own mothers to gain access to drugs that will reverse the course of these conditions. The proof of this is the shear number of snake oil (herbal) treatments for the same.

In addition the primary driver of Cancer research (the #2 killer) and Heart/BP/Circulatory (Heart disease is the #1) research is in the private sector. Entire companies like Myriad Genetics spend their entire research budget on Cancer research from identifying the cause and genes responsible to developing treatments including one-off genetic treatments that cost $50K a pop and they will never make money on.

You make serious light of depression in your post, something I have a serious problem with as it is a very serious disease that results in death far too often and something one of my loved ones suffers from. You might not think depression or ED is a serious problem but that doesn't give you the right to belittle the problem and decide that no money should be spent on it until whatever pet cause you have is cured.