NationStates Jolt Archive

Always. At least in the States.

I just had New Scientist delivered, and was browsing through when I came across an interesting article about potential 'new' treatments for cancer, using drugs developed 70 years ago to stimulate the growth of mitochondira, which are defecient in cancerous cells. Tests in rats and tissue cultures have shown very positive results. Of course, that's where it all goes wrong. Old drug means no patent. No patent, no profit. And no profit means no backers, no patient trials and a potential cheap, effective cure for cancer goes down the pan.

Of course drug giants are interested in the effects of the drug, in fact they are spending millions finding a more expensive variant they can patent and stick a £1000 price tag on.

So, we can have a cheap, effective drug in a year or so, or an expensive one ten years down the line. So my question is: when did profit trump common sense?

Link: http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg19325873.000-editorial-no-patent-no-cancer-drug-development.html

sadly it does in capitalism. the government should step in and pay for this cheap drug to be researched and tested.


btw, i think jolt is doing the timewarp again....

I just had New Scientist delivered, and was browsing through when I came across an interesting article about potential 'new' treatments for cancer, using drugs developed 70 years ago to stimulate the growth of mitochondira, which are defecient in cancerous cells. Tests in rats and tissue cultures have shown very positive results. Of course, that's where it all goes wrong. Old drug means no patent. No patent, no profit. And no profit means no backers, no patient trials and a potential cheap, effective cure for cancer goes down the pan.

Of course drug giants are interested in the effects of the drug, in fact they are spending millions finding a more expensive variant they can patent and stick a £1000 price tag on.

So, we can have a cheap, effective drug in a year or so, or an expensive one ten years down the line. So my question is: when did profit trump common sense?

Link: http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg19325873.000-editorial-no-patent-no-cancer-drug-development.html

Since business began. This is one of the few sad cases of what I stand for. Also is one of the rare occasions when the government needs to get invovled in the business world and make a special patent for this and give the rights to the company that would develop it the fastest

sadly it does in capitalism. the government should step in and pay for this cheap drug to be researched and tested.


btw, i think jolt is doing the timewarp again....Thank God. I just thought I was losing what's left of my mind and hallucinating.

sadly it does in capitalism. the government should step in and pay for this cheap drug to be researched and tested.


btw, i think jolt is doing the timewarp again....
Aye, it is!:p

can you quote the full article, NB? it wants me to pay for reading the rest :(

can you quote the full article, NB? it wants me to pay for reading the rest :(

The irony of that makes me ROTFL!

Ah, those humane capitalist values which should be a model to us all...

since the invention of the corporation, where increasing the profits of the shareholders became the one and only responsibility.

can you quote the full article, NB? it wants me to pay for reading the rest :(
Sure, the login's a bit buggered, so I'll do my best.

It gets better (http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1991886,00.html)

Most of the drug companies, meanwhile, no longer have any interest in hunting down new antibiotics because it's not financially worthwhile. Roche has dropped antibiotic research, while GlaxoSmithKline, BristolMyersSquibb and Eli Lilly have all cut down.

Old antibiotics are no longer working, and as bacteria develop resistance to an antibiotic a new one has to be developed. This costs pharma companies too much money when compared to long life drugs such as painkillers. See this is where capitalism falls down.

It gets better (http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1991886,00.html)

Old antibiotics are no longer working, and as bacteria develop resistance to an antibiotic a new one has to be developed. This costs pharma companies too much money when compared to long life drugs such as painkillers. See this is where capitalism falls down.

It gets better. Some want to force the pharmaceuticals to sell their drugs for a government fixed price.

Well, if you spent money developing the drugs over 5 to 10 years, you should expect to make that money back... plus interest.

Well, if the government officially says, "you cannot make money developing and selling drugs" then the pharmas will close their doors.

We seem to be developing new antibiotics here in the US.

yep. always. and you must remember: "common sense is not common"

That's fine for people who can afford them or have insurance. But developing countries are screwed because companies don't even want to make the cheaper drugs. I'm not sure if I can find it again, but I read someplace about the inability to obtain an older cheap anti-malaria drug because no one was willing to make it anymore.

Well, if you spent money developing the drugs over 5 to 10 years, you should expect to make that money back... plus interest.

And if you found out that a 70 year old drug that's cheap to make would cure cancer, you wouldn't tell anyone cause you couldn't make a profit right?

This is the whole point. Here we are, with a promising cure for cancer, and nobody will touch it. Why? Because they can't make $$$ for it. What next? Hospitals refusing emergency treatment cause you don't have good credit?

That's fine for people who can afford them or have insurance. But developing countries are screwed because companies don't even want to make the cheaper drugs. I'm not sure if I can find it again, but I read someplace about the inability to obtain an older cheap anti-malaria drug because no one was willing to make it anymore.

Which is why they should embrace the cheapest anti-malaria drug out there: Gin and Tonic.

And if you found out that a 70 year old drug that's cheap to make would cure cancer, you wouldn't tell anyone cause you couldn't make a profit right?

This is the whole point. Here we are, with a promising cure for cancer, and nobody will touch it. Why? Because they can't make $$$ for it. What next? Hospitals refusing emergency treatment cause you don't have good credit?

Obviously, someone told someone, because we know about it. So it's not "you wouldn't tell anyone".

If the company loses money on making something, it goes out of business.

Instead of fucking with the companies, why doesn't the government pick up the unprofitable items and pay to have them produced?

Obviously, someone told someone, because we know about it. So it's not "you wouldn't tell anyone".

Fine then, you wouldn't sell it because you couldn't make a quad digit profit off each pill/bottle/injection sold.


Instead of fucking with the companies, why doesn't the government pick up the unprofitable items and pay to have them produced?

So you would support paying taxes for something like this then? Weren't you the kind that went against government subsidized medication?

Obviously, someone told someone, because we know about it. So it's not "you wouldn't tell anyone".

If the company loses money on making something, it goes out of business.

Instead of fucking with the companies, why doesn't the government pick up the unprofitable items and pay to have them produced?Be fine with me. Be nice if they could undercut some of the drug companies on items that are no longer under patent. But that smacks of socialism. The neo-cons don't even want Medicare to be able to negotiate for lower prices from the drug companies.
And why are the same drugs made by the same companies cheaper in Canada than in the US? They're having fits over people ordering drugs from Canada on the grounds of the safety and purity of the drugs. Like Canada is some third world country or something.

The American drug industry is, was, and always will be a bunch of amoral, profit-mongering pricks.

Fine then, you wouldn't sell it because you couldn't make a quad digit profit off each pill/bottle/injection sold.

So you would support paying taxes for something like this then? Weren't you the kind that went against government subsidized medication?

If the government wants to produce unpatented medicine, I don't think even the drug companies would have a problem with it.

After all, who is going to get the government contract to produce them?

If the government wants to produce unpatented medicine, I don't think even the drug companies would have a problem with it.

After all, who is going to get the government contract to produce them?Well, they already have a problem, since they won't even allow Medicare to bargain. The "cheap" drugs would no longer be cheap because the pharmecutical company lobbyists would make sure of that.
The same way they've made sure Medicare can't bargain and are trying to make sure people can't get cheaper drugs from Canada.

I (finally) managed to get the full article:

SOME new cancer drugs emerge through better understanding of how the disease develops. Others work in ways we do not understand, and so give us fresh insight. It is rare to find a drug that sweeps away decades of assumptions and reveals a radical approach to treating all forms of the disease.

The drug is a simple, small molecule called dichloroacetate (DCA). Research in Canada led by Evangelos Michelakis of the University of Alberta has shown that it has promising anti-cancer properties. That's not all. The drug's mode of action is also generating excitement.

In 1930, biochemist Otto Warburg proposed that cells turn cancerous by changing the way they generate energy. Normally, cells rely on specialised organelles called mitochondria to supply their energy. Cancer cells switch to a process called glycolysis, which takes place in the body of the cell. It is an inefficient process, used by many bacteria - and marathon runners - when oxygen is in short supply.

Curiously, Warburg found that cancer cells continue to use glycolysis even when oxygen is plentiful. He argued that this fact, now called the Warburg effect, was a defining property of cancer cells. However, the idea did not catch on, not least because another famous biochemist, Hans Krebs, said the Warburg effect was only a symptom of cancer, not its primary cause. This scepticism was reinforced by the belief that cancer cells only switch to glycolysis because their mitochondria fail.

Enter DCA, which has been used for years to treat people with mitochondrial disease. The drug boosts the ability of mitochondria to generate energy. When given to cancer cells, it did the same: it seems that mitochondria in cancer cells are not irreparably damaged after all. What's more, functioning mitochondria help to kill off these aberrant cells (see "Cheap, safe drug kills most cancers").

When Michelakis tested the drug on cancer cells in culture, they died. When he gave it to rats with human tumours, the tumours shrank. It appears Warburg may well have been right that the switch to glycolysis is more than just a symptom of cancerous cells.

Best of all, DCA looks like a potential anti-cancer agent. It is cheap, does not appear to affect normal cells, we know its side effects, and it should work on all cancers. But there's a hitch: it is an old drug and so cannot be patented. No pharmaceutical company is likely to fund costly clinical trials without some exclusive rights to make the drug.

This is not a new problem. Many drugs are left on the shelf because companies cannot make lots of money from them. It has happened with drugs for diseases that affect mainly poor people in developing countries, such as TB, though there are now an increasing number of partnerships between governments, charities and commercial companies to deal with these cases. Cancer, by contrast, is chiefly a disease of the rich, and testing DCA will need a one-off effort.

It is a safe bet that drug companies will be falling over themselves to find patentable compounds with a similar action to DCA. Any of these reaching the market will be hugely expensive. It would be a scandal if a cheap alternative with such astonishing potential were not given a chance simply because it won't turn a big enough profit.

the big drug breakthroughs dont come from the drug companies they come from research universities.

this 70 year old treatment is being research and tested by the university of alberta. if it turns out to be a good treatment, it will be used.

as to anti-biotics, they are being developed.

http://www.dchieftain.com/news/68142-01-13-07.html


Two New Mexico Tech biologists are modifying a derivative of shrimp shells to develop treatments for a variety of viruses and bacteria.

Scott Shors and Snezna Rogelj of New Mexico Tech, and Shenda Baker of Harvey Mudd College in Southern California, have added a very basic amino acid to "chitosan," a derivative of the shells on shrimp.

"This is like a miracle drug," Shors said.

The chemical has killed E. coli, streptococcus and staphylococcus bacteria and a model of the tuberculosis bacteria.

"It's killing these things in a matter of minutes," Shors said.

It also destroys enfluenza, herpes and pox viruses.

However, Shors said tests showed the drug doesn't kill human cells or anything, just the bacteria and viruses.

but what does it do to the immune system and beneficial bacteria found in the human body?

Zomg, teh ebil corporations r holding back teh drugs taht could save human livez!!11!11one

You know, considering the state of humanity today, I'm really starting to wonder whether we -need- to save lives. If an epidemic were to kill off half the earth's population at a stroke, I wouldn't consider it much of a loss.

/SA speaking

but what does it do to the immune system and beneficial bacteria found in the human body?

thats why it has to be tested. there is no way to know until you do the research

the big drug breakthroughs dont come from the drug companies they come from research universities.

this 70 year old treatment is being research and tested by the university of alberta. if it turns out to be a good treatment, it will be used.

as to anti-biotics, they are being developed.

http://www.dchieftain.com/news/68142-01-13-07.html
Breakthroughs may come from universities, but the capital to fund trials and full scale production doesn't. And this is the problem. Companies are, instead of funding this, are developing patentable drugs, that do exactly the same thing as one developed decades ago, that they can charge big bucks on.

It's immoral profiteering at the expense of cancer patients and taxpayers that (outside the USA) fund the treatment.

but what does it do to the immune system and beneficial bacteria found in the human body?
The article says it doesn't effect healthy cells, and i'd assume that would include bacteria.

The article says it doesn't effect healthy cells, and i'd assume that would include bacteria.

There is no way to differentiate between good and bad bacteria. It said it didn't affect human cells.

There is no way to differentiate between good and bad bacteria. It said it didn't affect human cells.
Bacteria, being prokaryotes, don't have mitochondria, so it can't effect them at all.

Bacteria, being prokaryotes, don't have mitochondria, so it can't effect them at all.

Wrong discussion.