THis Is What's Wrong With For-Profit Medicine

[leela]

Another example of why many of us have lost faith in the medical system as it is now.

$1,000 Pill For Hepatitis C Spurs Debate Over Drug Prices

Graham says she thinks once Gilead has recovered its investment cost, it ought to cut the price of sofosbuvir.
"That's very unlikely that we would do that," responds Alton, Gilead vice president. "I appreciate the thought."

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/201...for-hepatitis-c-spurs-debate-over-drug-prices

 

[Hip]

Imagine if you dropped one of these $1000 pills down the sink plughole!

 

[Overstressed]

Another example of why many of us have lost faith in the medical system as it is now.



http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/201...for-hepatitis-c-spurs-debate-over-drug-prices

Hi Leela,
Thank you for that article. I was not aware of a cure for Hep-C. We can discuss about ethics, but how much does a "cure" cost, If you could gain back health? There must be a system for those who can't afford, so these people are not excluded from a cure.

At least Gilead "gives" the cure to the people, there are other pharmaceuticals, who buy and hide better (and cheaper) treatments. I've even heard that "DRACO" , a broad spectrum antiviral(cure) will not be commercialised.

Best wishes,
OS.

 

[Undisclosed]

Hi Leela,
Thank you for that article. I was not aware of a cure for Hep-C. We can discuss about ethics, but how much does a "cure" cost, If you could gain back health? There must be a system for those who can't afford, so these people are not excluded from a cure.

At least Gilead "gives" the cure to the people, there are other pharmaceuticals, who buy and hide better (and cheaper) treatments. I've even heard that "DRACO" , a broad spectrum antiviral(cure) will not be commercialised.

Best wishes,
OS.

I think there might be a huge difference between a fair profit and an obscene profit.

That being said, it's huge that there is apparently now a cure for Hepatitis C. Would be nice to see another disease eradicated. The current treatment for Hep C seems to be about 300 K and involves lots of nasty drugs, liver transplant, and lots more nasty drugs. This drug needs to be fairly available to anybody who has Hep C. The drug company in question does have a program to help those who can't pay (why wouldn't they if it costs them 150 - 250 dollars per patient).

There is a huge amount of discussion in the comments section of this article. Very interesting.

I also came across another interesting article related to the cost of medications.

It's also a huge ethical issue RE: the matter of big business and the value of human life.

 

[leela]

I think there might be a huge difference between a fair profit and an obscene profit.

this

 

[Hip]

I presume everyone knows that Dr Chia has said some of these new generation hepatitis C drugs coming out of the research pipeline may have efficacy against the non-cytolytic enterovirus RNA intracellular infections (from coxsackievirus B and echovirus) that Chia thinks play a major role in of ME/CFS.

Unfortunately, just a few weeks ago, it was demonstrated by Dr. De Palma that sofosbuvir does not have any efficacy against coxsackievirus B. (Though I am not sure if Dr De Palma checked to see if sofosbuvir is effective against the all important non-cytolytic intracellular RNA infections deriving from coxsackievirus B, rather than plain coxsackievirus B — it is these intracellular RNA infections that are the crux of the matter).

However, many more new hepatitis C drugs are still in the pipeline, so we keep our fingers crossed that one of these may work for us ME/CFS patients.

The hepatitis C antiviral drugs that are likely to work for enterovirus RNA intracellular infections are (I think) those which act as RNA polymerase inhibitors.

 

[Snowdrop]

I've always considered that our best hope might lie with drugs repurposed from the cure of some other "real" illness (quote marks obviously to indicate the perception that ME is not real as opposed to other illnesses being fake).