Bow Before the Limbaugh!

[Ramo]

Funding from industry disproportionately doesn't go into basic research, i.e. where the real innovation comes from. Looking at the paper you're referring to, the NIH in 2003 spent $14.8 billion in basic research versus $11 billion from industry.

More importantly, the numbers we're dealing pale in comparison to estimated savings from bargaining with the drug companies. The McKinsey Group has estimated a savings of $66 billion, which you'll notice is almost twice as large as the total pharmaceutical industry research in the paper. Assuming a drop-off in industry research funding proportional to the loss in revenues for the pharma industry (~10%), we could make that up many (somewhere between a factor of 20 and 60, depending on how much you want to emphasize the importance of basic research) times over with an increase in NIH funding from the savings.

BTW, to clarify things about the "lion's share," this survey includes medical device research under the category of industry research, which obviously isn't about drugs.

[Ramo]

I should add that this year, NIH funding increased by a large amount ($10 billion, IIRC), leading to an even larger discrepancy.

[The Mad Monk]

Doc, that's awful, but I find it hard to believe there were no other options available. There was no room for negotiation? No other hospitals? No charitable foundations? No house to sell?

I have a friend at work who's wife had liver cancer; the costs drove into him into bankrupcy and he lost his house. He has no complaints, he played the hand he was dealt, his wife recovered, and and eventually so did his finances. That's life. At least he had options of last resort he could turn to when push came to shove; I don't see that being the case if the governemnt becomes the first and only place to turn to.

Here's something really cool for you. Imagine how cool it would be if when you were a kid some televangelist told people that they ought to resist integration by closing down their county school systems. Imagine if you were one of the kids living in one of the counties which did so - so you didn't get an education. When yopu grew up you managed to get a job in a textile factory, but after about 15 years they took your pension fund in order to continue operating, then the next year moved your job to to Taiwan. You found another job at minimum wage with no insurance - after all you have no education. Then you got sick.
Oh, and they just named a highway after the televangelist who stold your education.

If a local government can do that much damage, imagine the ruin a national government can deliver.

Arrian, you have some good points, and something with more privatization than the British system I might be able to live with, but I have absolutely no faith in our politicians and bureaucrats to be that intelligent. Poor service and overspending have been hallmarks of our government, and I don't see that changing any time soon. I just don't trust them anymore.

...and Oerdin? I stopped trusting Bush a long time ago; I just trust the other side even less.

I suppose part of the reason I feel so strongly about this is because my mother broke her ankle while vacationing in Canada last year, and she got to experience that system first hand; I really should write about that some time.

[Whoha]

Funding from industry disproportionately doesn't go into basic research, i.e. where the real innovation comes from. Looking at the paper you're referring to, the NIH in 2003 spent $14.8 billion in basic research versus $11 billion from industry.

More importantly, the numbers we're dealing pale in comparison to estimated savings from bargaining with the drug companies. The McKinsey Group has estimated a savings of $66 billion, which you'll notice is almost twice as large as the total pharmaceutical industry research in the paper. Assuming a drop-off in industry research funding proportional to the loss in revenues for the pharma industry (~10%), we could make that up many (somewhere between a factor of 20 and 60, depending on how much you want to emphasize the importance of basic research) times over with an increase in NIH funding from the savings.

BTW, to clarify things about the "lion's share," this survey includes medical device research under the category of industry research, which obviously isn't about drugs.

The importance that I place is that someone is willing to try to invest in capital, and recoup that investment, and further to make a profit to advance the next drug. In other words the practical application of said basic research. How does that happen if every last penny is squeezed out?

[Ramo]

I didn't realize the pharmaceutical industry deems sales to the rest of the world as unprofitable. They still sell people drugs and make plenty of money.

This corporate welfare is totally unacceptable. It needs to end.

[The Mad Monk]

Wow. Just...wow.

Being permitted to sell your product at the price you deem fit is now "corporate welfare"???

[Ramo]

Not using your leverage to bargain over the price, something that every large organization but the federal government does, is corporate welfare.

This would be like the Army purchasing clothes from a vendor at retail prices.

And that's ignoring the intellectual property issues in this argument (i.e. the price is in large part based on whether the government is protecting a drug company's monopoly).

[DaShi]

Doc, that's awful, but I find it hard to believe there were no other options available. There was no room for negotiation? No other hospitals? No charitable foundations? No house to sell?

I have a friend at work who's wife had liver cancer; the costs drove into him into bankrupcy and he lost his house. He has no complaints, he played the hand he was dealt, his wife recovered, and and eventually so did his finances. That's life. At least he had options of last resort he could turn to when push came to shove; I don't see that being the case if the governemnt becomes the first and only place to turn to.



If a local government can do that much damage, imagine the ruin a national government can deliver.

Arrian, you have some good points, and something with more privatization than the British system I might be able to live with, but I have absolutely no faith in our politicians and bureaucrats to be that intelligent. Poor service and overspending have been hallmarks of our government, and I don't see that changing any time soon. I just don't trust them anymore.

...and Oerdin? I stopped trusting Bush a long time ago; I just trust the other side even less.

I suppose part of the reason I feel so strongly about this is because my mother broke her ankle while vacationing in Canada last year, and she got to experience that system first hand; I really should write about that some time.

So your entire argument is based on anecdotes and radio talk shows.

[Whoha]

And that's ignoring the intellectual property issues in this argument (i.e. the price is in large part based on whether the government is protecting a drug company's monopoly).

Thats right, patent protection for innovators

[The Mad Monk]

Not using your leverage to bargain over the price, something that every large organization but the federal government does, is corporate welfare.

This would be like the Army purchasing clothes from a vendor at retail prices.

And that's ignoring the intellectual property issues in this argument (i.e. the price is in large part based on whether the government is protecting a drug company's monopoly).

I will give you the refusal to use the leverage, but not the patents; patents are a reasonable reward for innovation.

[Ramo]

Innovation based on publicly funded research. But as I was saying, that's incidental to the argument.

[Whoha]

Innovation based on publicly funded research. But as I was saying, that's incidental to the argument.

Thankfully the Founding Fathers recognized the importance of supporting innovation and did not apply this type of standard to all inventions.

[Arrian]

TMM,

I understand your skepticism. It's something many - most, even - Americans share. The thing is, many of us have acquired an equal or greater skepticism concerning our current "private" healthcare system (not really private, not really public, just one big ****ing mess). I've reached the point where I'd rather trust a nationalized system than the one we have. And I'm one of the lucky ones who gets good care now.

-Arrian

[Ramo]

Again, I don't disagree with intellectual property. I was just pointing out that the price is largely controlled by the government. Appeals to the wisdom of the market ring pretty hollow here.

[DaShi]

Now I know where I've heard some of TMM's arguments before: Michael Savage. Of course. How could I forget that?