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Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (3044)	12/4/2007 7:49:04 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

If we don't pay for extra for the R&D then they will have to raise prices elsewhere. OK. So, then, how would we go about not paying for the R&D? Price controls? Or government direct purchase of the drugs and establishment of a monopoly distribution system? Or what?

To: Road Walker who wrote (3044)	12/4/2007 11:15:18 AM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

Certainty they would not stop R&D, but to the extent that you make the investment in R&D and testing less profitable, you get less of it. The expense is hundreds of million per drug. Count time value of money and the fact that many drugs fail and your talking about billions per successful drug. Reduce the amount that a blockbuster drug can profit the drug company and you reduce the incentive to take risks, you get less new drugs developed, and you get a larger percentage of them as low risk safe bets, like the "me too" drugs that you complained about (which are useful, and worth having in many cases, but I'd rather have them in combination with more risky innovation.)