Kasz216 said:
Ail said:
mrstickball said:
richardhutnik said:
Welcome to the gotcha that gold-plates America's health care and makes it expensive. Because of laws protecting IP research, companies spend a lot of money on new drugs and procedures, and techonology, which makes the US health care system like a luxury automobile maker. If you were to not offer any IP laws to protect, do you think the medical industry would research as it had? And this is likely part of the reason for costs soaring. When it comes to health, people will spend anything to have what they need to be healthy. Industries will build themselves around this.
The current system in the United States has a bunch of government money flowing into it, combine with neither harsh free market limitations on money, or government oversight to contain costs. So flushed with cash, and no restrictions, the system keeps driving prices up.
Do you think America would have nearly the spending it does in the medical industry if it wasn't profitable to do so?
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Additionally, the expenses on actually getting a product through the FDA are incredibly expensive. Many drugs fail trials, and their R&D costs are never re-couped unless the drug has a spin-off at a later date. Remove the stringent FDA regulations, and it becomes cheaper to do R&D for drugs (due to a higher success rate of the drug working), and the drugs can be provided to the public cheaper. Your assumption about profit is correct - profit motiviation means more research. Without the motivation, far less research would be done. The question is if the system is fair, and it is not. Due to the standards of the FDA, you will only have big pharma in power, producing drugs that can get through the red tape, leaving out other, smaller manufacturers and the like.
As for my argument about IP laws - I am not suggesting that there be no laws whatsoever, but they must ensure that the IP laws are fair and ensure competition, rather than massive monopolies to a chosen few. That is why pharma is so big and held by relatively few companies - because few have the monies to invest in massive R&D campaigns for drugs that may or may not be approved.
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You volunteering to test new drugs without the FDA process ?
Just wondering...
I mean who cares, they'll probably find some poor suckers that really needs money and will agree for a fee to tests new drugs.
In the grand scheme of scheme, who cares if a few hundred poor suckers die to develop a new drugs that can save thousands of lives, right ?
Because if you go full free market, that is what will happen...
/sarcams off............
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In the age of the internet... seriously? You don't think drug companies would get some PR slack with that?
What's stopping them from doing that now, just "outsourcing" those jobs overseas. (which does happen, but not int he quite ghastly way your talking about.)
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What makes you think they wouldn't do as Taco Bell has done regarding sand they use in their products:
This is completely false. The truth is that what has been referred to as "sand" is in fact silicon dioxide. Silicon dioxide:
is a safe, common food ingredient often used in spices, seasonings, and many restaurant and packaged foods;
is primarily used in food to prevent ingredients from sticking together;
Is a naturally occurring mineral, often found in water, leafy green and root vegetables, cooked dried beans, whole grains, cereals, and fruits;
Can be found in many kitchen pantries across America, often in mashed potato and rice mixes, coffee, soups, and many spices and seasonings;
Is approved for use in food by the Food and Drug Administration here;
Like many in the food business, we use silicon dioxide in the seasonings and spices for our taco meat. When cooked, our beef contains about .0005% (that is, five ten-thousands of one percent) of this ingredient, far less than the FDA limit of 2%. Furthermore, we use certified organic silicon dioxide. It is not artificial and is not a preservative.
Taco Bell says that the claims the use sand in their product is false. It is actually "silicon dioxide", which I guess isn't sand in their world. Wow, the FDA has a 2% limit on sand in their food. Next up, get people to buy the products.
And then, consider the use of Ephedra in nutritional suppliments:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ephedra
Additional evidence
A review of ephedra-related adverse reactions, published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2000, found a number of cases of sudden cardiac death or severe disability resulting from ephedra use, many of which occurred in young adults using ephedra in the labeled dosages.[5] Subsequently, in response to pressure from the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen,[10] Metabolife was compelled by the Department of Justice in 2002 to turn over reports of over 15,000 ephedra-related adverse events, ranging from insomnia to death, which the company had previously withheld from the FDA.[11][36] Use of ephedra was considered to have possibly contributed to the death of Minnesota Vikings offensive lineman Korey Stringer from heatstroke in 2001.[37]
[edit]Death of Steve Bechler
Steve Bechler, a pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles, died of complications from heatstroke following a spring training workout on February 17, 2003. The medical examiner found that ephedra toxicity played a "significant role" in Bechler's sudden death.[38] Following Bechler's death, the FDA re-opened its efforts to regulate ephedra use. According to Bruce Silverglade, legal director for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, "All of a sudden [after Bechler's death] Congress dropped objections to an ephedra ban and started demanding the FDA act."[11]
Senator Orrin Hatch, who in 1999 had helped block the FDA's attempts to regulate ephedra, said in March 2003 that "it has been obvious to even the most casual observer that problems exist", and called FDA regulation of ephedra "long overdue."[33] Given Hatch's prior defense of ephedra, Time described his statement as "a dazzling display of hypocrisy."[39]
It took an FDA ban to get a product off the shelf that was killing people. How many people do you want to die from corporate greed and excess in the name of you not having any form of government regulation? Do you also think cigarette companies would actually label their products unless they were ordered to by law? Even Orrin Hatch, a defender of the nutritional suppliments not being regulated, said ephedra needed to be regulated by the FDA.
