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in reply to Re: Would you work at a porn company?
in thread Would you work at a porn company?

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Re: (OT) Would you work at a pharmaceutical company?
by simonm (Vicar) on Nov 17, 2005 at 22:18 UTC
    ... infriging medical patents is just like pirating software. Someone invested money and effort, are you gonna steal it?

    Bullshit.

    Neither copyright nor patent violation involves "stealing" someone's money and effort.

    If you violated the patent and made a dose of the medicine to keep a child from going blind, the accountants at the drug company don't come in the next day and find that their safe has been busted open and their stack of cash is gone.

    So-called "intellectual property rights" are not natural (or "God-given") human rights; they are instead granted by a society, because we believe that it helps to align profit motive with the overall societal interest. (For example, the US Constitution puts it this way: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries".)

    Those commercial interests must be balanced against the fundamental human and societal interests which they are supposed to serve.

    Feel free to get on your high horse to denounce teenagers for downloading cracked copies of Duke Nukem -- but if you are going to talk about little children going blind, you ought to balance that ideology with some humanity.

    We may try as we can, pump money, food and medicine into these parts, but ...

    Again, bullshit.

    This isn't a question of "us" "pumping money" into "those parts" -- it's a question of large corporations sucking money out.

    The actual production of most pharmaceuticals can be carried out in the "developing" world; for example India has a bunch of manufacturing plants that can make generic versions of almost anything, and I'm sure they're not alone.

    The question is one of licensing payments, pumping money *out* of the poor countries and into the richer ones.

    If local governements or intertnational aid workers are trying to treat a disease, and in addition to the $30 for manufacturing they also have to pay $30 to the American company that owns the patent, they're only going to be able to buy half as many doses, and that means little children will be permanently blind.

    ... until they learn to make only as many kids as THEY can feed ... all the help will only increase the problems. The more children we save, the more children we have to feed and the even more children get born.

    Wait a second -- we're talking about a medicine that keeps children from going blind.

    Presumably, being blind is going to make it much harder for those children to grow up to be self-sufficient and take care of their own problems, right? People blinded since childhood are more likely to be dependent on aid, as opposed to someone with sight who can try to farm or get a job, right?

    So what's the upside of having the children go blind?

    Are you hoping that once they're blinded, they're more likely to die, so you won't have to send them food aid anymore?

    Or that maybe if they're blind they'll be less able to find a partner and have children of their own? It seems like a small step from that position to deliberate infection, forced sterilization, and other totally inhumane treatment.

    Do you want to walk that one back a little?

    -Simon

Re^3: Would you work at a porn company?
by shotgunefx (Parson) on Nov 30, 2006 at 22:59 UTC
    Have to call bullshit as well. Besides the fact that a good deal of developed drugs in the US are primarily developed with tax payer money, the fact is pharmacuticals have way too much power in the US. Yes, they deserve to make money, but seeing it is indeed a matter of life and death for almost every human at some point in their existance, they should not operate under the same freedoms as say, a record label.

    Take HDL, most doctors would agree that making synthetic HDL would help the majority of people with heart disease, a top killer. Yet it was never made.

    Why? It's easy enough to make, the fact is there is no money in it. Well actually, there is, but not the goddamn ludicrous margins they want.

    Result? Millions die. So they find a family in Italy that has HDL that is a little better than average, but more importantly, the mutation allows it to be patented. Right to market. It's bullshit. I'm willing to bet that almost everyone here knows someone who had a heart attack. Where's the outrage?

    I realize the drug companies are private, if they don't want to spend there money, fine. Why doesn't the goverment? It could save them untold millions (billions?) not to mention lives. The reason is conflict of interest.

    This is but one of many examples.

    -Lee
    "To be civilized is to deny one's nature."
Re^3: Would you work at a porn company?
by fauria (Deacon) on Feb 14, 2005 at 00:12 UTC
    I find your comment seriously offensive.

    However, i will make an effort satisfying your request, and i will call you what i wish:

    Heartless.

      Most people -- presumably not you, given your work experience -- do not realize just how expensive drug-discovery is.

      At drug companies, that process is ultimately funded by investors looking for profit, either directly or through mutual funds.

      Even if one expects all the scientists to work for free, and fires all the marketers and HR staff, you still have to pay for buildings and reagents. Some of the plastic-ware runs to $250 for a single-use flask.

      But I'm sure you already know that.

      So instead of making rude comments here, how about linking to the lobbying groups that advocate public funding of research in your area.

        The knowlege i might have in this area, which is not as big as you may think, is not related to my work experience.

        I have just developed system administration tools, and some monitors for Nagios (network management and monitoring tool) for the ebusiness area of a big pharmaceutical company (i dont mind updating this with its name if desired). It was a customer of the company in which i was working, not the pharmaceutical itself.

        This started because i said that working for a porn company would be moraly more satisfactory for me.

        I dont know what the European Union policies relating research in this area are. I know its expensive, but that will not change my mind.

        I dont think of this as the correct place for arguing this, i have replied you because you have posted as anonymous. Please, send me a private message, and i will continue this thread in another place
      I have to agree, not a shred of humanity in his response