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What is your life worth ...

Ed

Philosopher
E
Joined
Aug 4, 2001
Messages
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A Cancer Drug Shows Promise, at a Price That Many Can't Pay By ALEX BERENSON
Published: February 15, 2006
Doctors are excited about the prospect of Avastin, a drug already widely used for colon cancer, as a crucial new treatment for breast and lung cancer, too. But doctors are cringing at the price the maker, Genentech, plans to charge for it: about $100,000 a year.
That price, about double the current level as a colon cancer treatment, would raise Avastin to an annual cost typically found only for medicines used to treat rare diseases that affect small numbers of patients. But Avastin, already a billion-dollar drug, has a potential patient pool of hundreds of thousands of people — which is why analysts predict its United States sales could grow nearly sevenfold to $7 billion by 2009.
Doctors, though, warn that some cancer patients are already being priced out of the Avastin market. Even some patients with insurance are thinking hard before agreeing to treatment, doctors say, because out-of-pocket co-payments for the drug could easily run $10,000 to $20,000 a year.
Until now, drug makers have typically defended high prices by noting the cost of developing new medicines. But executives at Genentech and its majority owner, Roche, are now using a separate argument — citing the inherent value of life-sustaining therapies.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/15/business/15drug.html?hp&ex=1139979600&en=5ba29332c4ca5d56&ei=5094&partner=homepage
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Seems a tad immoral to me.
 
I'll take "Extortion" for $100k please, Alex.
 
Lets see how tough theyd be if we (the govt) ignored their patent.
 
Is there such a thing as a "just" price?

Cue market fundamentalists: "It's absurd that a company has to 'justify' the price of their drugs at all! The 'morality' of the matter is this: private entrepeneurs competing for profits; trading what they created with their MINDS for dollars. Simply allow the free-market to "discipline" those who charge "too much". When consumer sovereignty reigns supreme, everyone wins (except for those who don't). It's like Ayn Rand says in _Atl--."
 
The problem with arguments like this is that no one can ever name the "correct" price. If $100K is too high, what is the "correct" price?
 
My mom is recovering from colon cancer. I'm with Mark and fowlsound. But hey guys, remember, this is capitalism, the free-market, and all that. Screw human life, it's all about the $$.
 
Capitalism baby. If people want it, they can find a way. I don't want those freeloaders using my money to live.
 
This is one of the few instances in which I advocate violence. A few dozen corporate fatcats slaughtered in their beds, or torn limb from limb by angry mobs, would chill their ardor for money. Those who put a price on human life drive their own value to zero.
 
TragicMonkey said:
This is one of the few instances in which I advocate violence. A few dozen corporate fatcats slaughtered in their beds, or torn limb from limb by angry mobs, would chill their ardor for money. Those who put a price on human life drive their own value to zero.
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I'll get my coat...
 
TragicMonkey said:
This is one of the few instances in which I advocate violence. A few dozen corporate fatcats slaughtered in their beds, or torn limb from limb by angry mobs, would chill their ardor for money. Those who put a price on human life drive their own value to zero.
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I'm in granting I get to rip off my "limb" of choice first.

This isn't a free market. They have a monopoly over people's lives. If they could find a way to charge people for oxygen they would do it and you would pay whatever they charged too, but would this be moral? That free market idiot talk would end real fast. People have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Not just those who can afford it.

People's opinions on this based on whether they or a loved one have cancer or not are equally as pointless as letting the murder victims family decide what the punishment should be. You are making a judgement not based on facts or logic but on emotion.
 
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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...hive/2006/02/14/BUGGQH7QJQ1.DTL&type=business

Pullback in Avastin drug trial
Sudden deaths cause concern, Genentech shares tumble 2.3%

Swiss drugmaker Roche Holding AG said Monday it has stopped recruiting new subjects with colon cancer into a clinical trial evaluating the Genentech drug Avastin because safety overseers noted a higher death rate in one group of the study.

Seven trial participants in that group died: Four suffered sudden deaths (and three of those were younger patients -- surprising results that heightened the concern). Two in the same group, who were taking Avastin plus a chemotherapy regimen, died of heart failure. However, another group taking Avastin with a different chemotherapy combination showed no increased death rate.
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Hmmm.
 
Vagabond said:
I'm in granting I get to rip off my "limb" of choice first.

This isn't a free market. They have a monopoly over people's lives. If they could find a way to charge people for oxygen they would do it and you would pay whatever they charged too, but would this be moral? That free market idiot talk would end real fast. People have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Not just those who can afford it.

People's opinions on this based on whether they or a loved one have cancer or not are equally as pointless as letting the murder victims family decide what the punishment should be. You are making a judgement not based on facts or logic but on emotion.
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I think you're wrong. It is a free market, in a sense. But I used the word Extortion in my post above.

"Pay me $100K for this drug that will let you live" is not all that different from "Pay me $20k or I break your knees" "Pay me $500/wk so that no accidents happen to your business." in my opinion.

If they're the only show in town, I guess they can ask the $100k. It's only a matter of time before some other show appears in town, and undercuts them.

The ransoming of people's lives for exhorbidant amounts of money is what I find distasteful. I don't mind if they make a profit, but I do mind when it's an obscene profit based on other people's misfortune.
 
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