32 year old CEO Martin Shkreli displays an uncanny evil
Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli could be a blessing in disguise. The question is whether grassroots activist and politicians alike will take this gift to educate the citizenry at large or not.
But first the story — Turing purchased the rights to Daraprim, an FDA-approved treatment for the parasitic disease toxoplasmosis. FierceBiotech explains the reason for the purchase.
Since founding Turing last year, Shkreli has taken a page from what made Retrophin a high-profile–and controversial–player among small biotech companies. Retrophin’s stated goal was ferreting out value in biopharma by acquiring assets with potential in rare and neglected diseases, a process that can mean acquiring an underused drug and jacking up its cost to take advantage of rare disease pricing.
Retrophin’s was Martin Shkreli first startup. He was forced out for accusations of stock impropriety and his reckless immature Twitter use.
Martin Shkreli raised the price of the drug Daraprim from $13.50 to $750.00 per pill overnight. That is an increase of over 5555%. And under our current system it is completely legal however immoral or evil. That is the definition of unfettered and unregulated capitalism.
While what Shkreli did is extreme and evil, it is something that has been happening for some time now. Companies have been raising generic drug prices for some time.CBS Money Watch reported 5 reasons why this is occurring.
Consolidation. Acquisitions within the pharmaceutical industry is often cited as a factor in driving generic prices higher. Consumers end up paying more because consolidation means less competition among generic drug makers, allowing prices to rise.
Shortages. Raw materials for generic drugs have been an issue, according to researchers. …
Collusion. Some lawmakers suspect collusion may be at play, as well. It’s not a wild conjecture, given the FTC’s case this week. Generic drugmakers have also been accused of joining forces to keep prices high, such as a settlement announced last year by New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman. …
Prices were too low to begin with. Some pharmaceutical companies may have raised prices for generics after initially pricing the drugs too low, UCLA professor William Comanor told the Los Angeles Times. …
Because they can. When a generic drug has functional exclusivity, that can lead to eventual price increases, according to Schondelmeyer’s report. This can happen when a drugmaker creates the generic in a unique form, such as offering an oral liquid when rival generics are only sold in tablet form. That can allow a generic drug maker to boost prices.
For all those who believe in the benevolence of “The Market”, this must be a wake-up call. Watch and listen to this guy. It is not about humanity or cure. It is time for the government, “we the people” to be much more involved in the healthcare market. After patent expiration, all drugs should be manufactured by the government to remove all profit motives. It should be noted that research for many drugs are actually subsidized by government, the taxpayer, “we the people”.
Industry R&D risks and costs are often significantly reduced by taxpayer-funded research, which has helped launch the most medically important drugs in recent years and many of the best-selling drugs, including all of the top five sellers in one recent year surveyed (1995).
An internal National Institutes of Health (NIH) document, obtained by Public Citizen through the Freedom of Information Act, shows how crucial taxpayer-funded research is to top-selling drugs. According to the NIH, taxpayer-funded scientists conducted 55 percent of the research projects that led to the discovery and development of the top five selling drugs in 1995.
Martin Shkreli’s extreme action is doing us all a favor by pointing out that we are at the behest of a few. They can pull the plug at anytime lest we really take our country back. I hope all grassroots activists and moral politicians engage now to destroy this festering systemic evil within our system that kills our fellow citizens indirectly and for financial gain.