"SR" <srindler@da2.so-net.ne.jp> wrote in message
news:3fa32b2e$1_1@cosmos.uncensored-news.com...
>
> "SR" <srindler@da2.so-net.ne.jp> wrote in message
> news:3f9f2a7d_5@cosmos.uncensored-news.com...
> > Has nothing to do with Japan, but there are many from the US who might
be
> > surprised by the answer...
> >
> >
> > > What do the following US states have in common?
> > >
> > > Kentucky
> > > Vermont
> > > Massachusetts....
>
> Sorry... since nobody has come up with the right answer, I'll have to bag
> the great prize myself!
>
> ***********************************************************
> Here is the answer:
> The commonality is that each of these states favors legislation which
> would allow its citizenry to buy prescription drugs from Canada rather
> than pay exorbitant US prices.
> ***********************************************************
>
>
> If the Canadians are able to sell drugs made by the same manufacturers
> cheaper than US outlets, it's about time to do something drastic about it
> (boycott, suing them, etc.). After all, these are important and essential
> products which are needed (compared to rocking horses)...

I don't know the reason the prices are higher in the US. But as someone who
works for a pharmaceutical company, let me say that there is a lot of
misunderstanding about drug costs. The fact that something is important and
essential does not mean that it should therefore be made cheap to people who
need it. Drugs are extremely expensive to develop, due to two things; 1)
most drugs fail before they ever get to market. It is not uncommon to spend
millions of dollars on a drug that doesn't make it. I think the success rate
from the time a drug enters clinical trials to the time it is approved is
about 10%. This means that the one that makes it has to pay the development
costs of the 9 that do not. 2) all drugs need to spend 2-3 years in
preclinical testing, especially toxicology, followed by 3 - 5 years in
clinical trials. This is to ensure that the drug does not make people sick.
But even then sometimes it still will, in which case the drug company can be
on the hook for millions in lawsuits.

It is cheap for a company to knock off a drug, that is to just reverse
engineer the formula and make it. This happens all the time in India and
China. It can be sold cheap because someone else has paid for the
development costs.

This came up a lot in the debate about AIDS drugs. In the 1980s, drug
companies were criticized for "not caring" enough about AIDS to develop a
drug. Well, eventually drug companies suceeded, after spending hundreds of
millions of dollars. Then the public turned around and said "the drugs are
too expensive, you should make them cheap". In essence this is saying "OK
spend millions to develop a drug, and then on yeah .... now you pay for it."

I think that if drug companies are supposed to develop drugs they should be
paid for it. Financing the cost of this development is not the
responsibility of the pople who make the discoveries. It is the
responsibility of the society that says it needs these drugs because they
are "important and essential" products.

Having said that, I really have no idea why the drugs are cheaper in one
country than another.

-Marc