Well, here’s hoping that rather than re-investing their profits into dealing with anti-biotic resistance he buys a rare Siberian tiger or some other similar exotic creature that he tries to impress his douchebag friends by letting it roam around his (no doubt tastefully decored) penthouse apartment before it makes good on millions of years of evolution…
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a hedge fund manager…seems about right.
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Send him back to Albania.
There total cost to make a pill goes beyond just the material costs. Packaging, distribution, getting people to push sales etc all costs. Then there is the physical time on the machines to make the pill. You only have 24 hrs a day and factors like some drugs have higher mark ups lead to what you decide to make. There is a lot of logistics involved.
Like I said, clearly someone could come in and make some money on the drug and under cut the guy. But I have no idea how big of a drug it is and it may not be worth the time of other companies to ramp up making it.
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Actually there is huge demand for these drugs. It seems the real reason is a bit more basic and Capitalistic:
Why have some generic drugs gone up so dramatically? Consolidation within the generic pharmaceutical industry means that fewer companies are making generic medications. Just three companies, Mylan, Teva and Actavis, generated 44 percent of generic drug revenue around the world.
Another serious problem is shortages. A number of companies have stopped making certain generic drugs. Lack of competition has led to decreased supply and increased demand, resulting in price gouging.
a key factor, he said, has been “the rapid rise of single-source generics over the last five to six years,” driven in part by rock-bottom prices that have forced out weaker competitors and created a “functional monopoly” for companies left standing, as well as by industry consolidation.
In addition, Dr. Schondelmeyer said, it was “not unusual” that a year or two after a drug has been in shortage, one manufacturer will re-emerge in the marketplace with the drug price tripled. “So there is a connection between generic pricing, consolidation in the market and shortages,”
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I agree with you, and I hope what you hope.
I’m American, maybe you are too, we know how this works. Let’s just see how it panned out in a year. I guarantee no time served.
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Part of the company’s strategy is to control all distribution channels to prevent generic manufacturers from being able to perform clinical trials. Part of what generic manufacturers need to do is run bioequivalence trials to show that their generic is as effective as the name-brand drug, so their trick is to prevent generic manufacturers access to their drug to run those trials. Bastards.
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Some go to prison - Keating, Skilling, Madoff, Kozlowski, Sam Israel, and others, so you never know. Usually the trick to avoid a trip to Club Fed is a mix of being rich and connected. Shkreli has money (for now) but isn’t believed by the establishment, he’s a punchable douche. So I wouldn’t bet on him serving time, but he really seems to be working diligently to find his way into prison.
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It amazes me that it has become possible to do these sort of things with even cycloserine, one of the older antibiotics going back to 1955. I at least came across a fortunate update – the New York Times just reported the price increase has been spared a factor of ten, owing to Rodelis returning the drug to the non-profit that made it before.
It also notes the generic drug remains cheap abroad and would be sensible to just import, but it is probably not worth it for foreign manufacturers to get regulatory approval. I guess it’s not so surprising to hear the reasons why that should be so.
On the other hand it makes perfect sense that someone like Shkreli would want to make it overly expensive to get Daraprim, seeing that it is used to kill parasites.
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Based on the NYT article, it sounds like GSK is the only company in the world actually producing this medication. Shkreli has the exclusive distribution rights in the US, but doesn’t actually make it. And in 2014, there were less than 9,000 US prescriptions written for the stuff (outside hospitals). Which doesn’t sound like nearly enough to justify a competitor trying to surmount the barriers to entry (creating a production/distribution system, getting FDA approval), particularly when there is nothing to prevent Shkreli from dropping the price back down.
Definitely a free market failure.
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But it’s America! He’s living the dream! He’s a perfect example of a ‘good’ businessman!!
That all said, I hope he gets run over by a truck or Pizza Rat takes him out.
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Same here. It’s one of the antibiotics used to treat Lyme disease, which I caught last summer.
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I’m sure there’s numerous examples of this happening. Progesterone is another important drug that improves pregnancy. Talk about extortion…
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The top photo alone should earn this guy a much deserved kick in the nuts.
The rest of the article earns him a “Christ, what an asshole.”
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In related news:
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Time for a non-profit, co-op pharmaceutical to open shop and manufacturer all these generics at humane prices.
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Because Nixon’s plan to tax the poor out of existence wasn’t working fast enough.
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Hey, some good news!
A huge overnight price increase for an important tuberculosis drug has been rescinded after the company that had acquired the drug gave it back to its previous owner under pressure.
…
But Rodelis has now returned the drug to its previous owner, a nonprofit manufacturing organization affiliated with Purdue University, according to a statement issued on Monday by the organization.
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Did anyone else have a quick look at his twitter? All the messages to him basically say something along the lines of “I came here to shit on him, read an article and realize he’s the best person in the world.” Okay I’m exaggerating a bit, but did he just buy a crap ton of tweets to make him look better?
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Well, actually, yes. It takes months and months and most of a million dollars to get a bioequivalency done to stick a generic on the market, even of a drug with a patent this dead and gone. So even if you wanted to get into this business on the expired patent, the FDA is still going to make you wait it out a while.
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