[Kosh]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/HF17Ae01.html

Here's a few good ones

The WHO official also wrote that the stricter intellectual-property protection measures in the proposed US-Thai FTA would inevitably lead to higher drug prices and thereby jeopardize the lives of "hundreds of thousands" of Thai citizens who now depend on access to locally produced cheap medicines to survive. He noted too that the Thai government's current production of generic treatments had allowed the country to reduce AIDS-related deaths by a whopping 79%.

For its part, the US has long advanced the argument that without strong intellectual-property protection, the pharmaceutical industry will not have the commercial incentive to conduct research and development for crucial new medicines.

However, Brazil and Kenya recently claimed that about 90% of total global health-related research and development of Western pharmaceutical companies went toward addressing the medical needs of about 10% of the world's population. Those two countries have since called on the WHO to adopt systems for intellectual-property protection that would increase developing countries' access to health innovations and medicines

And the article is loaded with other things like this. Basically the US really deserves to be bashed......it deserves to be bashed because these policies are killing thousands of people every day.

[achtung]

Don't try to use this as an excuse for U.S. bashing.  The drug companies are to blame.

I hate when people just look for excuses to bash America.

[Mars]

But it's the US that's letting the companies get out of hand, because the US is in its corperations pockets.

[Night Hammer]

But it's the US that's letting the companies get out of hand, because the US is in its corperations pockets.

right and i assume you have real proof of that right?

no? then shhhh

[aldo_14]

But it's the US that's letting the companies get out of hand, because the US is in its corperations pockets.

right and i assume you have real proof of that right?

no? then shhhh

Weel, I can't really be arsed looking myself, but I'd suggest getting the names of the congressmen responsible for drugs legislation, and then looking up their campaign contributors.

[Mars]

I'm having trouble finding another source for this, which either means nobody cares, it's being hushed up, or it's not true. William Aldis is definitely a real person, and fairly high up as well. Until I find another source for this I can't prove anything; however, you want me to prove the government is in corperate pockets? How do you think congressmen have the ability to capagin?  They don't spend as much as the president I know, but they do enough so that their $150,000 a year salary won't cover it too well. They don't get that money from normal citizens, it has to be coming from somwhere.

As for the president, where does he get his funds from?

[Kosh]

But it's the US that's letting the companies get out of hand, because the US is in its corperations pockets.

right and i assume you have real proof of that right?

no? then shhhh

Just look at the campaign contributions. There's tons of evidence there. Don't tell me it is night when the sun is shining.

Don't try to use this as an excuse for U.S. bashing.  The drug companies are to blame.

It's up the the US to keep them in line. The US government uses its power over other countries to FORCE them to stop producing less expensive, life saving drugs just to line the american drug companies pockets. THAT is why the US deserves to be bashed. These are people's lives that are going to be lost because of what the US government is doing.

[Bobboau]

or you could phrase it as, there are thousands of lives that will not be saved useing a drug that was developed by an American drug company, because the people can't pay for it. that drug would not exsist to save anyone if one of these evil american corperations hadn't developed it. unless you are talking totaly unrelated treatments, something not based upon another drug then pay the people who invented it.

[aldo_14]

or you could phrase it as, there are thousands of lives that will not be saved useing a drug that was developed by an American drug company, because the people can't pay for it. that drug would not exsist to save anyone if one of these evil american corperations hadn't developed it. unless you are talking totaly unrelated treatments, something not based upon another drug then pay the people who invented it.

But why deny treatment to people who cannot, in any circumstances, ever afford it?  The issue is that countries have thousands of people suffering, dying, etc, and there are treatments, but they are priced so only the top xx% of people and nations can afford it.  These companies are scarcely losing business through it - Brazil, Thailand etc can't afford their product, it's not a lost sale.

[Mars]

I don't think any of us are saying that all of the employees working at giant companies are evil, the researchers at pharmasutical companies for instance, are likely very good dedicated people, but the companies managements are almost always bad.

[Kosh]

The "hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil" responce to this does remind me of why so many people hate the US so much......

[Sarafan]

Just slightly of topic, but does anyone know how much a congressman on the US costs? I mean, how much is his pay?

[Mars]

That's in my post, it starts at a little over $150,000 a year and goes up after that

That's from Wikipedia for the people who worry about citation...

[an0n]

People die without food. But you don't see anyone knocking out bootleg Pot Noodles.

The cheap drugs in the heathen nations get knocked out for the same goddamn reasons the American companies developed them: Profit.

But because the knock-offs don't have to cover research and development costs, they can undercut the officially produced drugs by a huge margin.

Way I see it, if you're a developed nation, the US companies should be allowed to gouge you. If you're from a piss-poor nation, they should just ignore the drug-piracy.

[aldo_14]

People die without food. But you don't see anyone knocking out bootleg Pot Noodles.

Um, subsidised exports?

[an0n]

Yeah, I was hoping no-one would notice that....

[Nuke]

i dont really see us drug companies makeing any usefull drugs. seems all the produce is money maker treatments for tolerable conditions. i dont mind that they market drugs to the rich in order to fund further reserch, but when they start gougiing on life critical drugs, that makes them a true evil. no doubt their marketing budjet could fund reserch into a new malaria vaccine. the usa is viewed as evil because it follows the christian tradition of making everyone around them like them  by any means nessiscary, moral or otherwise. if every country in the world was just like the usa, the world would colapse in on itself. our way of life is only sustainable so long as we have a lesser country to take up the burdon.

[Mars]

Some drug company makes a chemical replacement for my rapidly disapearing thyroid, if it wasn't for that I'd eventually die of complications (not until I was 70 or so, but still) Even though it's tolerable until then, it isn't fun, let me tell you.

[redmenace]

Companies don't have to create these drugs. Pharmacueticals are not a right. I suppose that people don't understand the risks and time and money involved in creating new drugs especially AIDS and Cancer drugs.

[Goober5000]

Here's the problem  A company spends millions of dollars to develop a cure for a certain disease (let's say bird flu).  Then the government forces them to give it away for free because there's supposedly a significant risk for a global bird flu pandemic.  So now the company has nothing to show for those millions of dollars.  What incentive does it have to develop a cure for the next pandemic that rolls around?

Like all tough moral dilemmas, this doesn't appear to have an easy solution.  Perhaps what should happen is the goverment itself buys the medicine and distributes it, instead of forcing the company to give it away directly.