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275 points swores | 7 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source | bottom
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hi-v-rocknroll ◴[] No.40173019[source]
Semaglutide retails for $17k USD/year in the US but costs only $60 to make. Perhaps it could be argued that the autoinjectors are "expensive", but not $17k/year and oral forms are coming online to make this item moot. In limited circumstances, excessive profits cross into the realm of price gouging and shouldn't be allowed by regulatory enforcement.
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1. 0cf8612b2e1e ◴[] No.40173374[source]
The first pill of a drug costs $1 billion to make. The remainder are all $0.01 a piece.
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2. willcipriano ◴[] No.40173557[source]
900 million or so of the total is used in the most important part of drug safety, share buybacks.
replies(1): >>40174646 #
3. geysersam ◴[] No.40173920[source]
In that sense it's not so different from digital content. Another arena where IP concept from the last century are a bad fit
4. itopaloglu83 ◴[] No.40174219[source]
Sure. The drug companies should be able to recoup their initial investment and also make a healthy profit as well. Nobody expects them to develop and manufacture something for free.

However, this must be based on their actual cost and not an arbitrary figure, which in the article was revealed to be roughly $34M real cost compared to $3B as it was advertised for lobbying purposes.

What is the best way to protect private ventures but also prevent them from sucking the public funds and the entire population dry? Transparency. Let's see where the money is being spent and compare it with other companies to see what's really happening here. The society doesn't allow vital resources like water, and recently internet be priced at extraordinary numbers, and control how much profit you can make. Maybe there should be even a cap at 100% profit, or 300%, or let's say 500%. But once a company starts selling a life saving drug at 17 thousand times the cost of developing AND manufacturing it, then there's something definitely wrong in that industry and the market must be investigated.

replies(1): >>40174753 #
5. ProjectArcturis ◴[] No.40174646[source]
Wait, these companies are making PROFITS that they're returning to INVESTORS??? I don't know whether to call 60 Minutes, the FBI, or The Daily Worker.
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6. s1artibartfast ◴[] No.40174753[source]
This trial used drugs that were first developed 90 years ago, and the people running the trial didnt do any development work, just bought them off the shelf. Check in on the cost of Semaglutide in 80 years.
7. willcipriano ◴[] No.40180023{3}[source]
"Free market rah rah rah"

"Let's reimport drugs then"

"No! The poor drug companies! How could they survive!"