Wants of companies when selling medicine

This is my prediction on the wants of companies when selling medicine.

• Long period of patent protection (more profits);

• No government price negotiations;
• Companies don't want imported medicine which can compete with theirs;
• Companies do not want cheap copies of theirs products even after their patents expire;
• They want to have a say in who makes it even after their patents expire;
• Companies hate compulsory licensing, like in India, or any other manner of control on the price;
• Companies like to create medicines for rich people's diseases like diabetes but not poor people's diseases like malaria;

Reported in The Washington Post “drug companies say high prices are necessary to cover their research to cover their research and development costs, enabling them to discover innovative new medicines. ’’

In 1953, a new drug was released by Burroughs Wellcome, a pharmaceutical company based in London.  The medications name was Pyrimethamine it was originally intended to fight malaria, after the microorganisms that cause the disease developed resistance to earlier therapies. The drug was used against malaria for several decades.

More than 40 years later, Burroughs Wellcome merged with the British pharmaceutical giant Glaxo. In 2010, the company, now GlaxoSmithKline, sold the U.S. rights to pyrimethamine.By then, the patent on the drug had long since expired, but because nobody bothered to make a generic.

In August 2015, there was another significant development in the drug’s history: CorePharma’s parent company, Impax Laboratories, sold it to Turing Pharmaceuticals. Almost immediately, the company raised the price from $18 a pill to $750 and this past week it sent its brash chief executive, Martin Shkreli, out to aggressively defend the new cost. A course of treatment for toxoplasmosis is about 100 pills, which under the new pricing would run $75,000. Why the astonishing increase? The answer is: Why not

WASHINGTON POST. (2015) Why do drug companies charge so much? Because they can. [Online] Available from:https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-do-drug-companies-charge-so-much-because-they-can/2015/09/25/967d3df4-6266-11e5-b38e-06883aacba64_story.html?utm_term=.ad1aa306b599 [Accessed: 21st February 2017]

According to Medical Daily “European public health experts estimate that pharmaceutical companies cashed-in over the last decade by pushing 'evergreen' medications on Swiss consumers. The researchers calculated that evergreening cost the healthcare system in Geneva an extra 30 million euros between 2000 and 2008.”

Drug patents last usually for 20 years, but much of this time is spent in the expensive research and development phase. It takes 12 years and $350 million on average to progress a new drug from the laboratory to a pharmacy shelf. The drug company will have 8 years left of patent time to sell the drug they have created

MEDICAL DAILY. (2013) Drugs

'Evergreen' Drugs Extend Pharma Patents, May Have Cost Swiss Consumers 30M Euros [Online] Available from:

http://www.medicaldaily.com/evergreen-drugs-extend-pharma-patents-may-have-cost-swiss-consumers-30m-euros-246489 [Accessed: 21st February 2017]

Causes Of People Having Unequal Access To Medicine

This is my prediction on the reasons why people have unequal access to medicine.  

• Poverty -- some people are too poor to buy food; how will they buy medicines;
• Not enough government support -- some governments like Japan, Canada, UK etc. help citizens get access to cheaper medicines, but many other governments (such as the U.S.) won’t do as much they can and some other governments (like India) don’t have enough money to help citizens;
• Many life-saving and critical or chronic illness medicines are super expensive, which means they are not available in poor countries (because companies don’t want to take the trouble of selling at a low price in poor countries)

We think this should be affecting who is given medicine

• When needed should be affordable and available
• We have to find a way of paying companies enough without putting the burden on poor people

How Poverty Affects Health-care

People living in poverty lack nutritious food which decreases their bodies chance to fight off diseases. Those people who are living in poverty cannot afford the appropriate medicine to treat their illness.  

THE BORGEN PROJECT. (2014) 5 Effects ofn Poverty [Online] Available from: https://borgenproject.org/5-effects-poverty/

[Accessed: 21st February 2017]

Access to essential drugs in poor countries: a lost battle?

Drugs offer is a simple and cost-effective solution to many health problems in the world, provided they are available, affordable and properly used. African Trypanosomiasis, Shigella dysentery, Leishmaniasis, tuberculosis and bacterial meningitis are just some of the examples of health problems in poor countries for which effective treatment is wanted.

MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS. (2016) Access to essential drugs in poor countries: a lost battle? [Online] Available from:

https://www.msfaccess.org/content/access-essential-drugs-poor-countries-lost-battle

[Accessed: 21 February 2017]

Lack of access is particularly concentrated in Africa and India.

Access to essential medicines appears closely correlated with other indicators of health system performance, such as disability-adjusted life expectancy.

The majority of low- and middle-income countries use essential medicines lists in selecting their medicines and are more likely to use these to limit procurement choices than are high-income countries.

Generic competition and differential pricing can contribute substantially to the affordability of medicines in low-income countries.

Bulk purchasing, careful price comparison, compulsory licensing and differential pricing schemes may help countries obtain better purchasing prices for medicines.

Greater scope for domestic price regulation exists in many low-income countries.

WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION. (2016) Chapter 7. Access to essential medicines [Online] Available from: http://apps.who.int/medicinedocs/en/d/Js6160e/9.html [Accessed: 21 February 2017]

Why people lack access to essential medicines

According to Medecins Sans Frontieres Doctors Without Borders, Millions of people die each year from diseases for which medicines are too expensive. They cannot prove this but we can.

MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS. (2015) Frequently Asked Questions The Access To Essential Medicines EXPO [Online] Available from:

http://www.umich.edu/~aamgj/DWB-FAQonEXPO.pdf

[Accessed: 21 February 2017]

Sovaldi works incredibly well to cure Hepatitis C.

The trouble? It costs $1,000 per day for all 12 weeks of treatment.

Laura Bush’s clinic (Laura Bush is a nurse-practitioner near Albuquerque) is a federally qualified health center in the rural town of Los Lunas, New Mexico, which means she sees a disproportionate number of patients who are underinsured, and on Medicaid, the government insurance program for the poor. In other words, they can’t afford Sovaldi. That means that they have no access to Sovaldi.

THE ATLANTIC. (2015) The True Cost of an Expensive Medication [Online] Available from: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/09/an-expensive-medications-human-cost/407299/ [Accessed: 21 February 2017]

About This Blog

Hi, my name is Aarna. I am 10 years old and in grade 5. This blog is about why people don't have access to medicine, the wants of companies when selling medicine, needs of individuals when reviving medication and how the cost of medicine determines who is given medicine.