D'bag, or Capitalist Hero?
 

A former hedge fund manager turned pharmaceutical businessman has purchased the rights to a 62-year-old drug used for treating life-threatening parasitic infections and raised the price overnight from $13.50 per tablet to $750

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/09/ex-hedge-funder-buys-rights-aids-drug-and-raises-price-from-13-50-to-750-per-pill/

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/21/business/a-huge-overnight-increase-in-a-drugs-price-raises-protests.html

major d-bag!

d-bag.

Capitalism requires many producers of similar products to work. Having a monopoly on a drug is not capitalism.

I didn't understand from the article why, if this drug has been around for 60+ yrs., there aren't lots of generic versions of it. How can they keep the exclusive patent on it for so long? If the profits really go to developing even better drugs, then it's probably a good thing. If no one else wants to bother making a generic because there's no money in it, then what we're seeing is the market at work. No one invests in a pharma company because they want to save the world; they do it to make money.

I think they mention something about companies who would want to create generic versions can't get their hands on enough samples due to regulation.

He also only has the rights to production in the USA. So that means that people can buy it in Canada or Mexico for probably less than the old price.

d-bag

I saw that, but I don't buy it. Any drug whose patent is long expired and can sustain a 5000% price hike would definitely be worth buying up whatever number of samples required to copy it. Whatever it costs, it would be worth it, especially given the bad PR Shkreli is going to suffer .... because of his d'bag-like appearance and, more importantly, all the people who think drug prices should be inversely proportional to their market demand - the opposite of how everything in capitalism actually works.

the price doubled in Canada.
I believe it is 35/pill. Cdn dollars.

All this guy did was what big pharma has been doing for years. Need a pill? Then pay up. It's all about the bucks. If you die because you can't afford the pill then that's your tough s h i t. Unfettered free market capitalism.

A friend of mine works for a large pharmecutical company. They spend lavishly and encourage such things as renting Porsches and Mercedes when on business trips. The rationale is that people know you work for them so no Chevy Impalas or Ford Fusions. Roll up to the five-star hotel in your Cayman.

Here in America money is the only truly practiced religion and just pray you don't get sick.

A drug that was produced and sold for a $1 just awhile ago will have several generic manufactures jumping to produce and sell it for a lot less than the current asking price of $35. :)

Saying it used to cost $1/tablet is pretty misleading. The first tablet usually costs upwards of $1 billion to bring to market. The second one and the rest then sell for $1. If they sell a billion of them (think Viagra or Crestor), then they get their investment back and make a profit. Making an orphan or otherwise rare disease drug is a lot different than the common stuff, which is why they usually get a much longer-term patent. They need more time to recoup their investment.

But if no one wants to bother making a generic copy of this one that just went to $750/tablet, then the price might not yet be high enough.

Anyone else out there willing to put up nine or ten figures for a drug everyone thinks should be priced according to public opinion instead of market economics? I wouldn't touch that.

This is a short term strategy. Eventually, a generic drug company will develop a generic equivalent, get it approved, and figure out the necessary distribution. That will take 2-4 years. If the drug doesn't sell enough per year, generic companies won't bother making the investment to do this, but in that case the price increase doesn't actually matter in the big picture. If you hugely raise the price of a drug, but hardly anyone takes the drug, then it isn't really a societal problem. It is a problem for a few unlucky individuals who don't have Medicare or adequate private insurance.

Lets correlate the response to this thread with the one about WV cheating the EPA. Should be interesting to see how the same people feel about the two things.

Something similar happened with Colchicine, a dirt cheap gout drug. Company bought up all the places making the generic form, closed them, and started selling a similar drug, Colchrist, that was different enough to be patented.

Oh yeah, total a hole d bag

D'bag, or Capitalist Hero?

Why not both? He is a hero to capitalism, AND a D'bag. He is just using capitalism in its most efficient state - monopoly.

Capitalism is the opposite of monopoly. Go take an economics class. SmileWavy

The ultimate goal of capitalism is monopoly.

and this is why pure capitalism has no place in modern society.

we DO need to act in the best interest of human beings. this aftermarket manipulation doesn't even have the excuse of needing a profit motive to develop the drug.

that is correct.

Incorrect. The goal of various participants in capitalism may be monopoly. The goal of capitalism is economic efficiency. :rolleyes:

I didn't say it cost a $1, I said it was produced and sold for a $1. Big difference. This was a quote from the news article.

Also read how big pharm stops generic drugs from being produced. " Though some drugs may have multiple patents – for the formulation, the chemical compound, the coating, or a new use among others – brand name companies will be permitted to sue a generic that wants to make their drug that is emerging from patent protection only once, instead of multiple times. Multiple litigations have been used to delay the ability of generics to enter the market."

Big Pharm sues on the formulation. They don't care if they win because it take a year or two before the case works it's way thru the courts (the longer the better) as this stops the generic production. Then they sue on the chemical compound. Same results, just a stall tactic for another year or two. Then the coating and then new use. If done right this process can extend the patent for 10 years.

You too, clearly, have no idea what capitalism is. Capitalism is many small producers (individuals or companies) making large volumes of products that are indistinguishable from producer to producer. This means the producer with the lowest price gets the most sales and the producer with the most efficient method of production has the highest profit.

Monopoly, oligopoly, marketing, branding, and specialty products are all methods for producers to break capitalism. Regulation and control are methods for government to break capitalism as they restrict new entrants from a marketplace and inflate the costs of production.

The media thinks capitalism is the same as corporatism. They are not. Corporations can engage in capitalism, or they can try to subvert it using the techniques I've mentioned above.

I don't agree with that, but I would definitely say that capitalism has no place in health care, period. Saving lives and improving health should never take the bottom line into consideration.

semantics. capitalism itself doesn't really have a goal if you want to put it that way.

but for darn sure the desire of those who participate is monopoly.

that is pie in the sky nonsense.

If the the Hindis and Buddhists are right ...

if he's getting $750 for that now, it's good incentive for someone to come in and produce it for less-

that's capitalism.

With that said, that pompous **** needs to be hung from a lightpole and I hope he gets run over by a bus or killed by a mob and his head placed on display on Wall St- as a warning.

rjp

Correct, but a barrier to the market, like a really long-lived patent, onerous government requirements, or harassing litigation are efforts to defeat capitalism.

This times ten thousand.

capitalism capitalschmism, the guy is a duche to profit that much from sick people; the research cost was long ago recooped.

The world isn't a black and white place, and he is probably a little bit of each.


I am mostly a free market enthusiast, but I do not believe it is a good market for health care. People have no reservation price for their lives and have no clarity on pricing nor the ability to shop competitively.

how is he supposed to fund research for the next drug, or why would he even want to bother?


Just playing devils advocate a bit

Research is the realm of universities.

funded by government / taxes?

Why should anybody care about your life? In a Darwinian world it is survival of the fittest and those that can't should fall by the wayside. Why should a society care about the halt, the lame, the stupid and worse Pelican members and their sensibilities.

"The money's in the medicine." --Chris Rock

D'bag due to the nature of the product; captialist by way of making profit by selling something at the height of what the market will bear. The goal of any company selling a product is to make as great a profit margin as they can. This guy did that, and my right brain applauds him. My bleeding heart hates him because it's a medication that he's selling, and many people likely won't be able to afford it at that price point, which very likely could cause/hasten their demise.

If you check this guy out, you will find him to be a career scumbag. And I don't mean stealing lunch from the free samples at the grocery store.

And the one with the highest profit buys out or runs out of business all of his competitors until he is the only one left. Then he can do what the douchenozzle in the OP did. Monopoly is the ultimate goal of capitalism. You are right about efficiency, competitors make the goal of profit inefficient, so they must be eliminated.