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Old 01-09-2016, 07:11 PM
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SR71 SR71 is offline
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Default Re: Two Minutes Hate

A Pill That Cures Hepatitis Costs Just $4, but If You Live in America It's $1,000 | Alternet

Gilead just rips off a formulation developed at university, gets a patent in the US, and starts uber charging for development they never paid for, IOW ripping us off. I hate that.

Quote:
In February, Doctors of the World filed a patent challenge in Europe against Sovaldi (sofosbuvir), arguing that “the molecule itself is not sufficiently innovative.”

They are claiming that Gilead merely copied their publicly funded research, patented it, and then spiked the price to reap insane profits. And reap insane profits, they did. In 2014, Gilead reported a total revenue of $24.9 billion as compared to the previous year’s $11.2 billion.
How much of difference does it make? A lot of difference, that's how much. A LOT!

Quote:
To contrast the extremely expensive treatment situation in the United States, we can look at India. In 2015, the Indian government denied Gilead a monopoly due to their inability to prove that the drug was more effective than the drug invented at Cardiff University in 2007.

Because they have no state-granted monopoly, Gilead has to compete in a free market in India. Competitors, of which there a many, using the older, much cheaper, and equally effective drug, have driven the price down to a mere $4 a pill. This makes total cost to cure your Hepatitis C in India’s free market $336. Compare that to the United State’s market controlled price of $84,000, and the situation becomes infuriating.
Corporate welfare at it's best, and no one will ever be punished. White collar crime, the legal kind of crime.
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