To Cure or to Treat: Cost/Benefit Analysis

TL;DR version: Do drug companies have a disincentive to find actual cures for common diseases and does that affect their research and development of treatments.

I was thinking I should hand the topic off to my Friend, Mike Yates. Often we hear that "They" don't want you to know ______________.

I usually scan past that sort of thing. The LFTR thread was from when I, against my better judgment, clicked on a video link labeled that way. I usually prefer to read over watching a lecture, but nuclear engineering interests me from a layman's point of view.

I was just having a discussion with a good friend. They have a family member with diabetes. I am fortunate that no one in my family that I know of has ever suffered from it. They are skeptical about well-intentioned drives for research into this very common disease, since there never seems to be much progress.

Like I said I have no direct experience with the disease and only a basic biological level understanding of metabolic processes of sugars and enzymes, a rudimentary understanding of the role of insulin, and only know the pancreas produces it but not how or why.

I have no idea what the challenges are to getting a pancreas to just make the correct amount of insulin.

Drug companies have a huge captive market of diabetics who need all sort of supplies to treat, rather than cure, the condition. Do you think they are actually working very diligently for a cure? Is an actual cure possible?

My view is there is no direct conspiracy to suppress any sort of cure. The researchers involved have egos and I would guess would value being known for a discovery over the money involved, since they don't directly benefit by the existing treatments.

Also there are plenty of non-industry research done in teaching hospitals and universities. Plenty of money from public and private grants to look for a cure.

I think it must be frustrating to those with loved ones that suffer, that a cure for whatever their condition is is not available.

I do know that drug companies have to consider things like "How many people are potential patients for this thing we are considering funding R&D for? How long will the course of treatment last? How much can we charge?"

Buried in one of the hour long LFTR videos is the suggestion that a particular very radioactive isotope has promise on really precision cellular level kills of cancer cells. My point is that some interesting medical breakthroughs may happen when we aren't doing medical science.

query said:

TL;DR version: Do drug companies have a disincentive to find actual cures for common diseases and does that affect their research and development of treatments.

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I'm sure the scary shit they are on about fixing....but the preventable/treatable stuff? Nawww they love that, that's bread and butter. Some by chance some by design imo.

At the end of the day they are still a business and shit like beetus, cancer and HIV are a trillion dollar cash mine. If you think they don't have any interest in protecting that you're lying to yourself.

query said:

Is an actual cure possible?

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For Beetus?



Yea...it's called put the 32oz coke and double double with cheese down....get the fuck off that ass and do some PT or even work.

Americans problem with fat ass/heart disease/beetus is no mystery......if we just got everyone off their ass for 30 min a day and ate right (which starts with farming right) our health problems would start a reversal trend and the beetus would become a real non issue problem that just isn't seen in many people.

I prefer to not think about this issue. I am on medication that keeps me alive and I'd like to think it is the best at this moment. If you rely on medication, I think it's best to hope for the best. I know that taking medication regularly is the best way to prevent problems, so just don't think about it.

As a debatable topic, I would envision the drug manufacturing business like a subducting tectonic plate. The information is out there, but it can go down under the need for profit.

In my opinion though, people really do choose the right option. I hope that fame also has some sway in how companies act. There is always the option of expanding to other diseases, like with the March of Dimes.

BotanyBoy said:

I'm sure the scary shit they are on about fixing....but the preventable/treatable stuff? Nawww they love that, that's bread and butter. Some by chance some by design imo.

At the end of the day they are still a business and shit like beetus, cancer and HIV are a trillion dollar cash mine. If you think they don't have any interest in protecting that you're lying to yourself.



For Beetus?

Yea...it's called put the 32oz coke and double double with cheese down....get the fuck off that ass and do some PT or even work.

Americans problem with fat ass/heart disease/beetus is no mystery......if we just got everyone off their ass for 30 min a day and ate right (which starts with farming right) our health problems would start a reversal trend and the beetus would become a real non issue problem that just isn't seen in many people.

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True that.

I do know that the bulk of diabetes in this country is influenced by such things. I had a friend that was reasonably active but had never concerned himself with his intake until diagnosed with some early stage of diabetes in his mid thirties. To avoid having to take medication he actually went out and followed the Doc's advice. He had a schedule, he walked every single night, and completely changed his diet. Hard to say how well that reversed things because he died a couple of years later in fit, good health from an aneurysm

When I was young there were twins in my neighborhood, very active, slender kids. They had juvenile diabetes which as I understand it has a different cause, but the same effect. I might have that wrong, though.

Though currently employed, I would be interested in a six-figure salary from a drug company that will pay me to not discover cures.

People who lambast pharmaceutical companies as being in it "only for the money" always fail to complete the thought.

You typically only get the money if you make products that are effective. Drugs that cure would naturally be in higher demand than those that merely manage an existing disease.

I don't know of any pharmaceutical company that went bankrupt because we conquered tuberculosis or polio in the United States.

Colonel Hogan said:

People who lambast pharmaceutical companies as being in it "only for the money" always fail to complete the thought.

You typically only get the money if you make products that are effective. Drugs that cure would naturally be in higher demand than those that merely manage an existing disease.

I don't know of any pharmaceutical company that went bankrupt because we conquered tuberculosis or polio in the United States.

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A very cogent point.

To ride along on it, the bragging rights to a major cure would have blue-sky valuation that would be tough to discount.

Suppose a drug company discovered a cure for diabetes, cancer or whatever.
People are still going to get the disease. I'd say it's more likely they'd want the cure rather than treatment for the rest of their lives.
Remember, too, the regulatory state. It can take years and millions to get approval, and that comes after years of research and tests before the approval process begins.
I'm skeptical a company would invest a billion or so in a cure for cancer, then sit on it because they also make profitable chemotherapy drugs.
What happens when another company's cure for the same disease gets FDA approval? The original company has made the investment in finding the cure, but is years away from marketing it because they still have to clear the regulatory hurdles.

Rangudo said:

Suppose a drug company discovered a cure for diabetes, cancer or whatever.
People are still going to get the disease. I'd say it's more likely they'd want the cure rather than treatment for the rest of their lives.
Remember, too, the regulatory state. It can take years and millions to get approval, and that comes after years of research and tests before the approval process begins.
I'm skeptical a company would invest a billion or so in a cure for cancer, then sit on it because they also make profitable chemotherapy drugs.
What happens when another company's cure for the same disease gets FDA approval? The original company has made the investment in finding the cure, but is years away from marketing it because they still have to clear the regulatory hurdles.

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I agree with your reasoning. I think the argument is though: that the company doesn't invest the billion on the cure, because they are satisfied with the income stream they have from the treatment.

I reject that for the same reason you do. They can never be certain that it won't be cured by some other firm. I think if they are not working on a particular disease it is either a situation of two few potential customers, or they just don't (currently) have what looks like a viable angle to attack the problem.

Some of the ideas being researched are pretty remarkable with gene therapies and person-specific cancer therapies and such.

Colonel Hogan said:

People who lambast pharmaceutical companies as being in it "only for the money" always fail to complete the thought.

You typically only get the money if you make products that are effective. Drugs that cure would naturally be in higher demand than those that merely manage an existing disease.

I don't know of any pharmaceutical company that went bankrupt because we conquered tuberculosis or polio in the United States.

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Salk gave the patent on his vaccine away for free.

query said:

TL;DR version: Do drug companies have a disincentive to find actual cures for common diseases and does that affect their research and development of treatments.

I was thinking I should hand the topic off to my Friend, Mike Yates. Often we hear that "They" don't want you to know ______________.

I usually scan past that sort of thing. The LFTR thread was from when I, against my better judgment, clicked on a video link labeled that way. I usually prefer to read over watching a lecture, but nuclear engineering interests me from a layman's point of view.

I was just having a discussion with a good friend. They have a family member with diabetes. I am fortunate that no one in my family that I know of has ever suffered from it. They are skeptical about well-intentioned drives for research into this very common disease, since there never seems to be much progress.

Like I said I have no direct experience with the disease and only a basic biological level understanding of metabolic processes of sugars and enzymes, a rudimentary understanding of the role of insulin, and only know the pancreas produces it but not how or why.

I have no idea what the challenges are to getting a pancreas to just make the correct amount of insulin.

Drug companies have a huge captive market of diabetics who need all sort of supplies to treat, rather than cure, the condition. Do you think they are actually working very diligently for a cure? Is an actual cure possible?

Click to expand...

My Dad has to do a 4 hour dialysis 3 times a week. He's a Nam vet who was exposed to agent orange. This does not anger me as much as watching him go down fast over the course of two years...about 4 years ago.

At that time, he finally got so sick that somebody at the VA looked a little closer and realized that they'd been giving him the wrong sized syringes for injection of his insulin for about two years. They had him injecting it so deep into his tissue that it did no good...and he got sicker and sicker and sicker.

He's in and out of the hospital almost monthly now. He has no immune system left. He's 76 years old and I thank God he's still with us.

Well, to answer your question. ANY illness is a goldmine for someone. YOU are the best doctor you have if you take the time to do the research. Still, you should see a gen pract regularly, but simply take care of yourself.

Fala said:

My Dad has to do a 4 hour dialysis 3 times a week. He's a Nam vet who was exposed to agent orange. This does not anger me as much as watching him go down fast over the course of two years...about 4 years ago.

At that time, he finally got so sick that somebody at the VA looked a little closer and realized that they'd been giving him the wrong sized syringes for injection of his insulin for about two years. They had him injecting it so deep into his tissue that it did no good...and he got sicker and sicker and sicker.

He's in and out of the hospital almost monthly now. He has no immune system left. He's 76 years old and I thank God he's still with us.

Well, to answer your question. ANY illness is a goldmine for someone. YOU are the best doctor you have if you take the time to do the research. Still, you should see a gen pract regularly, but simply take care of yourself.

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Yes. I agree. Sorry about your dad. I lost mine last year at 76. Probably because of benzine exposure when he used to run can manufacturing plants. My mom is a nurse, did his end of life hospice care, drugs, that sort of thing. They always fought a lot but were sweet at the end. Gives one hope.

My mom has always been proactive about the care we get. When I was s child she would take the needle from the doctor and inject us kids herself. Her reasoning was doctors don't know what the are doing and give injections less often. When I had a major compound fracture from a motorcycle accident (mom did not know I owned one) she was there in the ER while I was still bleeding on the gurney. She saved my foot by pointing out that it was not getting proper circulation.

It annoys me that I have to go to a doctor when I need meds. I usually know exactly what I need and if I don't my mom or brother does. I don't ask my brother to write me scripts because as an OB/GYN I am sure it would raise some red flags somewhere.

I agree with Hogan. Not to mention I think there are just too many damn moving parts for this particular conspiracy to work. The guy who cures 'X' is gonna be rich and I mean the kind of rich that basically lasts until the government says "Fuck you that's why" and you couldn't just kill them you'd have to kill their entire line.

You want me to conceded they might have more efficient ways they could do something and don't. That's possible and even plausible. But an end game? Nah.

Rangudo said:

Though currently employed, I would be interested in a six-figure salary from a drug company that will pay me to not discover cures.

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To discover better treatments.....phrasing is everything.

Colonel Hogan said:

People who lambast pharmaceutical companies as being in it "only for the money" always fail to complete the thought.

You typically only get the money if you make products that are effective. Drugs that cure would naturally be in higher demand than those that merely manage an existing disease.

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Therapy treatments like Chemo or w/e are effective. And those that cure would only be in higher demand for a limited time. Therapeutic treatments are in high demand FOREVER.

Why sell them a 1,000 dollar cure when you can sell them 500/mo therapy for 10 years?

Colonel Hogan said:

I don't know of any pharmaceutical company that went bankrupt because we conquered tuberculosis or polio in the United States.

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Nope but no pharmaceutical company pleased stock holders with any cure ever...and they know it. Therapeutic treatment is a better business model for the medical industry.

Rangudo said:

Suppose a drug company discovered a cure for diabetes, cancer or whatever.
People are still going to get the disease. I'd say it's more likely they'd want the cure rather than treatment for the rest of their lives.

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Yes but which one would the COMPANY make the most off of?

Rangudo said:

Remember, too, the regulatory state. It can take years and millions to get approval, and that comes after years of research and tests before the approval process begins.

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What's that got to do with what is good for the company not anywhere near what is good for people causing conflicts of interest given the right circumstances?

Rangudo said:

I'm skeptical a company would invest a billion or so in a cure for cancer, then sit on it because they also make profitable chemotherapy drugs.

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You honestly find it hard to believe a company wouldn't squeeze it's cash cow for every drop before cashing it in for the meat? You must not be very familiar with business and how it gets done in America then.

Rangudo said:

What happens when another company's cure for the same disease gets FDA approval? The original company has made the investment in finding the cure, but is years away from marketing it because they still have to clear the regulatory hurdles.

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Then you release yours and compete or throw the patent in their face and tell them to eat your freedom loving nut cheese, but the question is who cures what first? What company is going to kill the 120 BILLION dollar a YEAR cash cow that is tha beetus ?

That's like multinational war starting amounts of money and you don't think it's possible for some corporate sociopaths could get a lil crooked for it? LOL Fuck sociopaths even the most moral tight ass could be corrupted REAL fast by that many zeroes.

I'm not saying it is happening, but I am saying it's far from the most fucked up implausible conspiracy theory ever put out. American companies and our government have both been caught red handed in more dubious acts.....

Give us diseases, fuck with our brains on insane LSD doses, sell us crack/cocaine......but they are too upstanding to stand by and let some companies keep a good chunk of us ill to make a couple trillion a year long term style? IDK about that.....

What I do know is...

My personal opinion: I think only few drugs help what they are supposed to help.

Sean Renaud said:

I agree with Hogan. Not to mention I think there are just too many damn moving parts for this particular conspiracy to work. The guy who cures 'X' is gonna be rich and I mean the kind of rich that basically lasts until the government says "Fuck you that's why" and you couldn't just kill them you'd have to kill their entire line.

You want me to conceded they might have more efficient ways they could do something and don't. That's possible and even plausible. But an end game? Nah.

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That's why I started with "they." I never believe in "they" because separated by about 15 years I worked for 2 major corporations. Billions of dollars in revenue. I would see things that were costing them millions. Once I had one such idea accepted but only because they were already working on it and they had an MIT mathematician I could talk to about it.

More recently, I had a very simple idea. It cost them nothing to implement my idea. They simply have to believe me that it is the problem as I describe it. Basically we had two fuel tanks 1100 gals and 1300 gallons. The computer only knew about the 1100 gallon version. I did the math one night in my truck, explained it to them how I arrive at 2 million dollars a year because the trucks are going in every shift instead of 4, maybe 5 out of 6 shifts for fuel. You lose 20-30 minutes of productivity on a $100/minute truck and it adds up. No one believed me, no one would send the idea up the chain. Eventually they got trucks with 2,000 gal tanks. Those were going in twice a shift based on projected fuel consumption. So they wrote the patch I suggested two years after I suggested it at a loss of 4 million opportunity dollars.

"They" cannot understand numbers much less plot their way out of a proverbial wet paper bag.

THE REVEALED TRUTH:

Back in the 80s APPLE and MICROSOFT cut the throats of all players in the computer game, using innovations as their happy daggers. The few survivors paid the tuition and learned their lessons. 1. Kill your competition, and 2. Bury innovations in your basement until you can market them for a fat profit. Don't release v.2 till every child owns v.1.

The drug companies also use this model. I know a man who pays $7000 a month for his meds, after the patent expires the same meds will likely cost 50 cents at the dollar store.

query said:

That's why I started with "they." I never believe in "they" because separated by about 15 years I worked for 2 major corporations. Billions of dollars in revenue. I would see things that were costing them millions. Once I had one such idea accepted but only because they were already working on it and they had an MIT mathematician I could talk to about it.

More recently, I had a very simple idea. It cost them nothing to implement my idea. They simply have to believe me that it is the problem as I describe it. Basically we had two fuel tanks 1100 gals and 1300 gallons. The computer only knew about the 1100 gallon version. I did the math one night in my truck, explained it to them how I arrive at 2 million dollars a year because the trucks are going in every shift instead of 4, maybe 5 out of 6 shifts for fuel. You lose 20-30 minutes of productivity on a $100/minute truck and it adds up. No one believed me, no one would send the idea up the chain. Eventually they got trucks with 2,000 gal tanks. Those were going in twice a shift based on projected fuel consumption. So they wrote the patch I suggested two years after I suggested it at a loss of 4 million opportunity dollars.

"They" cannot understand numbers much less plot their way out of a proverbial wet paper bag.

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I feel like I often have to start conversations with "I'm not arguing with you" but I'm not.

That said the scenario you present isn't them trying to screw the customer (which is what Bot, Hogan and I were discussing) it was just being loathe to change. I get that you don't fix shit that ain't broken.

Bot's argument is really two arguments fused. The first being that the rich would prefer to bleed us for years than kill us and the second being that they have all agreed upon this and won't fuck each other. The first part I don't disagree with per se (though I imagine that enough rich people understand inflation and inheritance and other mechanics to know that a billion today is better than a billion over the next twenty years. Assuming you're not poor going in. Do I need to explain that part?) the latter I don't. Nor do I think you could plausibly erase them when they have to know the game.

Sean Renaud said:

I feel like I often have to start conversations with "I'm not arguing with you" but I'm not.

That said the scenario you present isn't them trying to screw the customer (which is what Bot, Hogan and I were discussing) it was just being loathe to change. I get that you don't fix shit that ain't broken.

Bot's argument is really two arguments fused. The first being that the rich would prefer to bleed us for years than kill us and the second being that they have all agreed upon this and won't fuck each other. The first part I don't disagree with per se (though I imagine that enough rich people understand inflation and inheritance and other mechanics to know that a billion today is better than a billion over the next twenty years. Assuming you're not poor going in. Do I need to explain that part?) the latter I don't. Nor do I think you could plausibly erase them when they have to know the game.

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Yes they don't like change, but my point is even when presented with cost accounting they cannot make decisions in their best interest financially, so how could they possibly get together and decide something as complex as therapy A versus possible cure B.

query said:

Yes they don't like change, but my point is even when presented with cost accounting they cannot make decisions in their best interest financially, so how could they possibly get together and decide something as complex as therapy A versus possible cure B.

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And my mostly agreement is that numbers don't survive the battlefield and you presenting them with a "better way" even assuming it was better is change. I don't know your industry so I'm assuming there was no draw back to your plan it's still change.

The argument here is that it's better to keep fixing something than to actually fix it. And in theory it's quite simple. We don't cure shit. In practice however I think it's not possible.

Sean Renaud said:

And my mostly agreement is that numbers don't survive the battlefield and you presenting them with a "better way" even assuming it was better is change. I don't know your industry so I'm assuming there was no draw back to your plan it's still change.

The argument here is that it's better to keep fixing something than to actually fix it. And in theory it's quite simple. We don't cure shit. In practice however I think it's not possible.

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I agree that that from a business model makes sense. It is rare that any corporation can actually adhere to their strategy, especially one that, for obvious reasons would have to be unstated.

They are drug companies, they manufacture drugs. Why would they search for a cure when that simply isn't a part of their business plan? It isn't that they have a "disincentive" - finding a cure simply isn't why they exist. If they develop a drug that cures, they will release it and make money.

LadyFunkenstein said:

They are drug companies, they manufacture drugs. Why would they search for a cure when that simply isn't a part of their business plan? It isn't that they have a "disincentive" - finding a cure simply isn't why they exist. If they develop a drug that cures, they will release it and make money.

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oh noes!
you just made queery look stupid! prepare yourself to read his 3 page reply !

#hestooinsecure

queerywhiner said:

oh noes!
you just made queery look stupid! prepare yourself to read his 3 page reply !

#hestooinsecure

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You needed an alt for this?