OT Food for thought

Thousands of products are market segimented for various reasons. The
ability ot pay is one reason. If you doubt it exist go to your local fly
shoop adn check out fly rods.
The drugs are the same. IF you sold them to Canadians for the same price
that you sell them in the US they would not buy as many and you would make
less money. As a US comsumer of drugs you get to pay more of the
developement and research cost. Once a drug has been developed and tested
production cost is relativly nothing. If every drug company in the world
gave up research and developement all existing drugs could be produced very
cheaply.
IIf stopped all progess on everything we could by with 8086 compputers,
1982 model cars and bamboo fly rods.
wrote in message
...
On Sun, 29 Feb 2004 08:48:19 -0700, Willi wrote:

(snipped severely)

The Canadian government
also regulates the price paid for drugs.

And the drug companies keep selling to them. I doubt they're taking a
loss on the deal.

As an aside, the FDA keeps yammering about the possible dangers of
reimportation of drugs. Huh? REimport? This implies that the drugs
are made here, sold to Canada, and then come back here. So why should
they be dangerous? Do they have special factories that sell
substandard medications to Canadians?
--

rbc:vixen,Minnow Goddess,Willow Watcher,and all that sort of thing.
Often taunted by trout.
Only a fool would refuse to believe in luck. Only a damn fool would rely
on it.

http://www.visi.com/~cyli

On Mon, 01 Mar 2004 06:33:23 GMT, "B J Conner"
wrote:

Thousands of products are market segimented for various reasons. The
ability ot pay is one reason. If you doubt it exist go to your local fly
shoop adn check out fly rods.
The drugs are the same. IF you sold them to Canadians for the same price
that you sell them in the US they would not buy as many and you would make
less money. As a US comsumer of drugs you get to pay more of the
developement and research cost. Once a drug has been developed and tested
production cost is relativly nothing. If every drug company in the world
gave up research and developement all existing drugs could be produced very
cheaply.
IIf stopped all progess on everything we could by with 8086 compputers,
1982 model cars and bamboo fly rods.
wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 29 Feb 2004 08:48:19 -0700, Willi wrote:

(snipped severely)

The Canadian government
also regulates the price paid for drugs.

And the drug companies keep selling to them. I doubt they're taking a
loss on the deal.

As an aside, the FDA keeps yammering about the possible dangers of
reimportation of drugs. Huh? REimport? This implies that the drugs
are made here, sold to Canada, and then come back here. So why should
they be dangerous? Do they have special factories that sell
substandard medications to Canadians?
--

rbc:vixen,Minnow Goddess,Willow Watcher,and all that sort of thing.
Often taunted by trout.
Only a fool would refuse to believe in luck. Only a damn fool would rely
on it.

http://www.visi.com/~cyli

BJ

What if I told you that one of the major players in the American drug
prices war is a British company - Glaxo Smithkline PLC. Also that
American drug companies have oversea research labs -- for example,
Viagra was invented and developed in Sandwich, England at a Pfizer
lab. Canada has its own pharmaceutical research industry. So tell
me, why should the American consumer pay through the nose to support
research in other countries? Pay more for the same drugs than
consumers in those countries?

I have my own theory but I'd be interested to hear yours.



Peter

turn mailhot into hotmail to reply

Visit The Streamer Page at http://www.mountaincable.net/~pcharl...ers/index.html

"Peter Charles" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 01 Mar 2004 06:33:23 GMT, "B J Conner"
wrote:

Thousands of products are market segimented for various reasons. The
ability ot pay is one reason. If you doubt it exist go to your local fly
shoop adn check out fly rods.
The drugs are the same. IF you sold them to Canadians for the same price
that you sell them in the US they would not buy as many and you would
make
less money. As a US comsumer of drugs you get to pay more of the
developement and research cost. Once a drug has been developed and tested
production cost is relativly nothing. If every drug company in the world
gave up research and developement all existing drugs could be produced
very
cheaply.
IIf stopped all progess on everything we could by with 8086
compputers,
1982 model cars and bamboo fly rods.
wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 29 Feb 2004 08:48:19 -0700, Willi wrote:

(snipped severely)

The Canadian government
also regulates the price paid for drugs.

And the drug companies keep selling to them. I doubt they're taking a
loss on the deal.

As an aside, the FDA keeps yammering about the possible dangers of
reimportation of drugs. Huh? REimport? This implies that the drugs
are made here, sold to Canada, and then come back here. So why should
they be dangerous? Do they have special factories that sell
substandard medications to Canadians?
--

rbc:vixen,Minnow Goddess,Willow Watcher,and all that sort of thing.
Often taunted by trout.
Only a fool would refuse to believe in luck. Only a damn fool would
rely
on it.

http://www.visi.com/~cyli

BJ

What if I told you that one of the major players in the American drug
prices war is a British company - Glaxo Smithkline PLC. Also that
American drug companies have oversea research labs -- for example,
Viagra was invented and developed in Sandwich, England at a Pfizer
lab. Canada has its own pharmaceutical research industry. So tell
me, why should the American consumer pay through the nose to support
research in other countries? Pay more for the same drugs than
consumers in those countries?

I have my own theory but I'd be interested to hear yours.



Peter

turn mailhot into hotmail to reply

Visit The Streamer Page at
http://www.mountaincable.net/~pcharl...ers/index.html

Drug companies have enough lawyers and accountants to get away with
differential pricing. Viagra, which made more than a few of us money, was a
serendipitous event that came about because Phizer had the people to
recognize and develope what they found. What would happed if it were
discovered in a government lab in Canada? It's got a lot of old fat guys
paying for basic of research.
And then if you want to see where a lot of the money goes got to
http://www.aflcio.org/corporateamerica/paywatch/ and select health care. The
salary of the CEOs of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies probably took home
the equivalent of the Canadian research budget.

On Tue, 02 Mar 2004 03:12:20 GMT, "B J Conner"
wrote:



Drug companies have enough lawyers and accountants to get away with
differential pricing. Viagra, which made more than a few of us money, was a
serendipitous event that came about because Phizer had the people to
recognize and develope what they found. What would happed if it were
discovered in a government lab in Canada? It's got a lot of old fat guys
paying for basic of research.
And then if you want to see where a lot of the money goes got to
http://www.aflcio.org/corporateamerica/paywatch/ and select health care. The
salary of the CEOs of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies probably took home
the equivalent of the Canadian research budget.


Since we're into websites, check this one out.

http://www.canadapharma.org/Members/

Well, just to pick two that I can find numbers on, Glaxo and Aventis
spend 150 million a year on R&D in Canada.

See my comments to Cyli

Peter

turn mailhot into hotmail to reply

Visit The Streamer Page at http://www.mountaincable.net/~pcharl...ers/index.html

You seem to think I'm picking on Canada I'm not. the pharmacutical bussiness
has been global for a long time, Drug companies go where the smart people
are. Canada has an excellant education system and a lot of smart people and
it's now supprize the world drug companies are there. Manyo of the
companies on that website are foreigned owned or really international
companies. A lot of that money spent on R&D in Canada shows up on the
books in other countries as an expense. I don't believe everything was
invented here, In fact our most creative days may be over. People use to
create and develope things to make money, now there is a lot of "wealth"
created that has no tangable reason to exist. Like I said you need lawyers
and accounts as well as smart people. Discussion and study can go on for
ever and take thousands of case studies at MBA schools.
The system may be messed up but we need to be carefull in trying to fix
it. I know two people very dear to me who would be dead if not for some
brilliant researcher in Indianapolis or Quebec ( by the way how did all
those places wind up in Quebec?). We need to make sure the goose keeps
laying golden eggs while we put in the coop.
"Peter Charles" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 02 Mar 2004 03:12:20 GMT, "B J Conner"
wrote:



Drug companies have enough lawyers and accountants to get away with
differential pricing. Viagra, which made more than a few of us money, was
a
serendipitous event that came about because Phizer had the people to
recognize and develope what they found. What would happed if it were
discovered in a government lab in Canada? It's got a lot of old fat guys
paying for basic of research.
And then if you want to see where a lot of the money goes got to
http://www.aflcio.org/corporateamerica/paywatch/ and select health care.
The
salary of the CEOs of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies probably took
home
the equivalent of the Canadian research budget.


Since we're into websites, check this one out.

http://www.canadapharma.org/Members/

Well, just to pick two that I can find numbers on, Glaxo and Aventis
spend 150 million a year on R&D in Canada.

See my comments to Cyli

Peter

turn mailhot into hotmail to reply

Visit The Streamer Page at
http://www.mountaincable.net/~pcharl...ers/index.html

Well, just to pick two that I can find numbers on, Glaxo and Aventis
spend 150 million a year on R&D in Canada.

Although the drug companies boast about the gigantic sums they spend
on research, the fact is, they spend only a trickle compared to their
incomes.

Data uncovered by a US Senate investigation of the drug industry some
years ago revealed that the eleven biggest firms spent only six
percent of sales revenues on research, but they spent 24% on
advertising and promotion. Four times as much.

So you can see where they place their emphasis.

And beyond that, much of the "research" is just to find some way to
tweak an existing drug whose patent is running out, so it can be
renewed. The "new" drug is usually not any better than the previous
version, but it will sell for a higher price.

vince

From: vincent p. norris

And beyond that, much of the "research" is just to find some way to
tweak an existing drug whose patent is running out, so it can be
renewed. The "new" drug is usually not any better than the previous
version, but it will sell for a higher price.

You mean like Claritin and and Clarinex? {;-)


George Adams

"All good fishermen stay young until they die, for fishing is the only dream of
youth that doth not grow stale with age."
---- J.W Muller

From: vincent p. norris

And beyond that, much of the "research" is just to find some way to
tweak an existing drug whose patent is running out, so it can be
renewed. The "new" drug is usually not any better than the previous
version, but it will sell for a higher price.

You mean like Claritin and and Clarinex? {;-)

George Adams

Yes, I think so, although those came after my retirement, when I began
paying less attention to the sins of the drug companies and more to
fishing.

vince

B J Conner wrote:

Drug companies have enough lawyers and accountants to get away with
differential pricing. Viagra, which made more than a few of us money, was a
serendipitous event that came about because Phizer had the people to
recognize and develope what they found. What would happed if it were
discovered in a government lab in Canada? It's got a lot of old fat guys
paying for basic of research.

I thought old fat guys were the target market. :-)

I can just imagine those old fat Canadian bureaucrats, bull****ting over
their cubicle walls: "Hey, look here, guys. This drug doesn't cure
cancer, but it has this side effect ..."

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

From: "B J Conner"

As a US comsumer of drugs you get to pay more of the
developement and research cost.

Not to mention the obscene cost of advertising on TV, and perks to the doctors.
Now there's a place where significant cuts can be made with no sacrifice to R&D
or quality.

Ever wonder why Viagara is so expensive? You can't watch TV for an hour without
seeing at least one ad for some sort of limp dick medication.


George Adams

"All good fishermen stay young until they die, for fishing is the only dream of
youth that doth not grow stale with age."
---- J.W Muller