Free Markets

Roche should be told to get stuffed and we should pump this stuff out with abandon

If the scientists are right, we are in big trouble. Or you can trust the politicians!

The great flu pandemic of 1918-9 killed over 50,000,000 people worldwide in a couple of years, as if WWI had not been bad enough. Pandemics have occurred about 2-3 times per century, in the last two centuries. The increasing concentration of people throughout the world, and especially the huge slums of the large cities of the Third World, create a perfect scenario for all this to happen again.

Viruses are notoriously difficult to fight, and the flu vaccine used every year offers absolutely no protection against the avian strains. A new experimental vaccine has been developed by Sanofi, a French Pharmaceutical company. So far one drug has been found to be effective in vitro. It is called Tamiflu, and it is sold by the Swiss Pharmaceutical company Roche. The drug, a neuraminidase inhibitor, is totally synthetic and it is very difficult to prepare. Its effectiveness against a live pandemic remains unproven, but it seems to represent our best hope. A similar neuraminidase inhibitor, Relenza, is marketed by British firm GSK. It may or may not be effective against the H5N1 virus.

The most prepared countries are Canada, New Zealand, Norway, UK, and Ireland, who have enough Tamiflu to treat 40% of the population, if needed. The US, perhaps in an unselfish act, isn't hoarding much of anything. Germany is placing a hefty order with Roche, which claims to have 4 factories producing the drug. In spite of that, the Swiss giant is being criticized for their slow production rate. Many have invoked breaking the patent exclusivity and allowing others to manufacture the drug. This is a no-brainer. In times of emergency, the free market won't help us. Yet, so far Roche's exclusivity and their right to make a profit has been solemnly respected. I have seen the process by which Tamiflu is made. It is long and tough and raw materials are not available in huge amounts. Scientists should start now expanding production of this potentially life-saving drug. Nothing of the kind is even contemplated. Some scientists, like Michael Osterholm from the Univ. of Minnesota, are being increasingly critical about the lack of urgency in spite of the little time left. In the end - he says, - the scientists will be judged on the basis of the passion and the energy with which they championed this human cause.

Some interesting stuff here

Earth fights back.

As you say, the markets are useless for this. The markets are about selfishness, not altruism. Hence my comment about Roche. And I shall extend that to the other pharmaceutical companies. Not much good trying to flog your drugs at a premium and hang onto those patents if the population of the Earth is decimated. But then corporations have no conscience, no ethics, no sense of duty, no regard for anyone except their selfish selves.

Hah, old Karl was right, the seeds of destruction and all that.

Sorry bout call them Roch in the original post, it is Roche.

I've read a bit more about the whole thing since I posted. I have to say the figures that freedom4free said about the UKs amount of Tamiflu. I've read they've got an order in that will take 2 years to forfill if production is doubled, this order is enough to be dished out to 25% of the population. But maybe that's just the order and we've already got some saved up, but from what I heard when this stuff was first getting some news coverage we didn't have any.

I've also read there is problems in getting Tamiflu produced. Not only is it hard to manufacter but the fruit that one of the main ingrediens comes from is only grown in China...and 90% of the crop has already been havested. So even if other companies got the green light to make the Tamiflu, and got a production line started up, they still wouldn't be able to make much of the stuff.

Tamiflu isn't a vacine, it lessen the effects and risk of Bird Flu. There is a case in Vietnam of it not working, so this may not be the mirical cure for bird flu.

Also I don't see why people are sitting about waiting to bring chickens in doors. It seems like they're waiting to find a bird on British sores with arien flu before they try and stop a spread of it. This seems insaine to me, how hard is it to chuck chickens in a shed? If this is an effective method for helping control the spread then why not do it now?

"The virus will soon be in North America and Europe" (From that link Freedom4free put up)

It is in Europe now, Turkey and Romania have both had confermed cases.

Do birds migrate from between America and Asia/Europe? I would of thought they would of headed for South America, but that may be a stupid assumption.

Anyway I'm off to think about something other than the potetial for impending doom...

Perhaps you should look at the history of vaccination production. There used to be several companies that produced vaccines in the US. They went out of business when the government got involved to insist that 1) vaccines be cheap for all children (which admittedly sounds great) and 2) that there be even tighter (more expensive) regulation on vaccine producers. These two things combined resulted in US companies dropping vaccine production as too risky without adequate financial benefit. The market was working - the goverment intervention skewed the market until it is no longer working and we don't have adequate flu vaccine.

I would like to get my hands on the vaccine for my family and I, that is for sure! The simple fact is that the freemarket reacts to slowly. Once a company gets a patient for a drug it sells it at a premium as long as it can to increase the profit margin. Then once the patient is up other companies can start producing the generics and etc making it available to more at a better price (result of competition).

If a company cannot make a good profit to offset the research and development cost then what is the use in doing the research in the first place if you cannot make a good profit? The latter is problematic when a new drug needs to be made available to tens of millions in such a short time at the cheapest price possible. Government interaction can speed up the process by letting other companies start producing the drug now!!!

AliceInW- the problem is that companies in the freemarket cannot not afford the cost of the research if they could not get the benefits of premium pricing for a set period of time before the competition is able to drive the prices down through supply and demand.

[quote="yardsale Government interaction can speed up the process by letting other companies start producing the drug now!!![/quote]

You haven't addressed the R&D/profit issue at all. If companies know that the government will do this, why would they do the R&D at all? There's no profit in it. There would be nothing for the government to allow other companies to produce.

Right now, the companies that could have produced the vaccines have re-worked those areas of their facilities to produce other things and there would be large expenditures to go back to vaccine production. If the government, rather than demanding that companies sell their product cheap in order to provide cheap vaccines, would buy at market value, there would still be those companies producing vaccines. If the government shows willingness only to force low profit margins, companies will continue to drop out of the business. It's a classic case of government, albiet with the best of intentions, inadvertently hurting future production. The very best thing government could do now is place a huge vaccine order at market prices and get the hell out of the way to let companies do their job - the market is incredibly fast when there is profit to be had; incredibly slow when they can't make money.

Did you even read my post?




Or just contract scientist to do the research and then contract multiple companies to produce the drug. It is the conflict of European liberalism (capitalism) and socialism. I would be willing to bet that the independent company that has the drug patient could not keep up with the supply, and it is a matter of simple economics, if the supply goes down and the demand goes up the price is driven up. There is no way that one company can keep up with the demand that is eminent.

The bottom line is that independent companies are driven by the need to create a profit not the need to provide the drug to as many people as possible, so that a pandemic can be prevented or thwarted. It is no secret that unmonitored capitalism is not geared toward the common good and anyone who thinks otherwise needs to do some research on the subject! Government is necessary to provide equilibrium, or we would end up with, the rich, the poor, and no middle class.

Other way around here Alice - our federal government privatised the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories.

This government owned

became this privatised

Which is the more effective model is yet to be established. We shall no doubt find out shortly.

Good post yardsale.