https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/sky-high-drug-prices-senators-blame-patent-abuse-rcna153350
Democrats and Republicans accused drugmakers of taking advantage of patents to keep cheaper competition off the market.
Translation: "Your subscription is running out, please 'donate' to us to renew and make this issue go away again."
It's almost like having a free market and a system to limit intellectual theft can't coexist.
Patent abuse is certainly part of it. The taxpayers have also subsidized every major pharmaceutical in recent history, while the drug companies sell them back to us at exorbitant prices and keep 100% of the profits. It kinda feels like the problem is just...capitalism. It's almost like a profit driven system is antithetical to the goals of the healthcare industry.
Abuse is a feature.
The mere existence of patents is abuse, theft, and bald-faced corruption. Burn the system to the ground.
I invent something. Since there are no patents, my idea is put in the open. A big company sees my idea and uses its much bigger budget to advertise and out sell me, putting me out of business. How's that not abusive?
Patents prevent theft. Patents on medicine based on publicly funded research is stupid. I could be persuaded that it's theft in that particular instance. But in general, no patents are not theft.
IP isn't going to withstand generative AI, at least not in a recognizable form. I don't know what that means for the market.
That almost made sense in the age of the cotton gin. It does not any more. All patents are abuse. Always. Every time.
Case in point: you “invent” something (which is guaranteed to be something - or a combination of somethings - that are already extant, btw)… a corporation…
Already has a similar patent and crushes you with the sheer legal corruption and power that comes with ostentatious wealth.
Files the patent before or via other loophole supersedes your filing… and THEN crushes you with sheer legal corruption and power that comes with ostentatious wealth.
Either way, they win. And even if you win, chances are you’ve merely stolen some concept that should always have been public domain, anyway.
You see this as a way to fight against wealthy corporations, but no matter how you swing it, it’s theft. It’s plain old theft from society and the public… and the bigger and wealthier you are, the more you can steal. Just because “little guys” can sometimes engage in such legally-protected theft doesn’t make it any less theft.
I agree that by and large most patent law is rigged in favor of corporations. All I'm saying is that things are always more complex than simple black and white. I chose a simple response because I believe that you have already made up your mind and it would be a very difficult and nigh impossible conversation. I do like the energy that you put into looking out for people though and that should be commended.
We collected all the clues and logged them as evidence. They are evidence now. You should look at them some time instead of burying your head in the sand and imagining your own.
How would funding work, then? If everything I do is available to the public with no protections on my end, then I can’t guarantee that I (the inventor) will ever be able to extract any value from some thing that I put a lot of time and effort into developing. Considering we live in a capitalist society, there needs to be a way to reimburse inventors.
As the person above me pointed out, how do you prevent a large company on capitalising on ideas that a small inventor has?
Considering we live in a capitalist society, there needs to be a way to reimburse inventors.
As the person above me pointed out, how do you prevent a large company on capitalising on ideas that a small inventor has?
This is your answer. The problem is Capitalism and enabling/perpetuating tools of Capitalist abuse is no solution at all. Under our current system, the thing you ask “how do we prevent” is currently happening. it does not provide protection for “small inventors” - it provides a way for big companies to churn put patents by the hundreds/thousands/millions.
I wouldn't go that far in terms of patents in general but patents on medications definitely, especially if the research that went into them were funded using tax dollars.
They don’t want to actually fix anything, just to complain about it and blame it on someone else.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The patent system is meant to reward innovation by allowing drugmakers to exclusively sell new medications on the market for a set period of time — typically 20 years.
That tactic is referred to as "evergreening" — an industry practice in which a drugmaker extends the patent by making small tweaks to the drug or the device used to deliver the medication.
The practice of making tweaks to a drug or its delivery device is not illegal, Arti Rai, a professor at Duke University School of Law, told lawmakers.
Late last month, the Federal Trade Commission challenged hundreds of patent listings it said were intended to prevent lower priced drugs from reaching the market.
Eli Lilly has successfully extended Humalog's patent multiple times since its approval over 20 years ago, keeping generic versions off the market until recently.
The active ingredients in them haven't significantly changed over the past three decades, he said, yet prices remain high because extended patents have limited competition.
The original article contains 582 words, the summary contains 163 words. Saved 72%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
The PBMs and their back room rebates are largely to blame. There's legislation that passed the house to bring more light to these but the Senate won't put it on the floor.
I say the current system is acceptable as long as exclusive manufacture is suspended after 20 years. No matter the delivery system, the original drugmaker can't prevent generics from being produced after that date. Royalties would still have to be paid within 40 years of the original FDA approval.
20 years is too long, make it 5. These corporations make billions in those 20 years they can more than afford to scale that shit back and make a paltry few hundred million instead. Imo that would also be an incentive to continue developing new medication that can then also be exclusive for 5 years. Maybe, I'm not an economist.
You mean incentivise them to innovate instead of letting them sit back and rake in the profits for decades? Are you actually trying to benefit the public sector instead of the private one!? Madness!!!