New tumour shrinking drug will be shelved - no funding

[Merridith]

Hi everyone:

This has been bugging me for a while. Here is an example of a new potential drug in the arsenol - one that could tackle cancer, is easy to take (no chemo infusions!) and has potentially fewer than usual side effects............. the drawback? It's not patentable because the medicine is already in the public arena.

http://calsun.canoe.ca/News/Alberta/...99917-sun.html

http://www.economist.com/science/dis...ory_id=8548706

Therefore there will be no funding available to move this drug forward. Millions apon millions are being raised & donated to fund research. I assume that most of that money goes to subsidize the efforts of existing pharma. What about research like this that is already in the public arena and will probably die on the vine?

Fewer and fewer universities can afford to do empirical research anymore. It all has to be "partnered" with private enterprise. The government sits back and waits for the results of private enterprise research & billions of dollars of trial results to be conveniently dropped in their laps for licensing.

How many other possibilities are there just left lying on the floor due to lack of profitablility?

I admire the "risk-takers". Companies & people that combine their resources to produce the research that create drugs. Naturally people/companies that put their money at risk need a reward for doing so as the potential to NEVER see any of their money back again exists.

But the government & the public need to also support these other types of endeavors. Ones that could be just as beneficial - but don't have the financial incentive attached needed to create the huge pool of investors to finance the risky tests & trials needed to bring it to fruition.

Does anybody have any ideas?

Merridith

[AlaskaAngel]

See "New Drug For All Types of Cancer" posted several days ago by Clara on the articles forum for additional discussion.

[Joe]

There are many independent groups which can fund the trials: Avon Foundation, Komen Foundation and Calfornia has a breast cancer research fund for such a purpose.


Regards
Joe

[Christine MH-UK]

Taxol was not patentable because the researcher who discovered its potential usefulness against cancer hadn't filed the patent within the required time period, but it still made it to market, in part because Orphan Drug laws were used to encourage its development. Of course, the taxol case is very controversial, with some groups arguing that the US government conceded too much to the drug company that received exclusive rights to the drug for ovarian cancer. Still, since most cancers are orphan diseases (I think only the most common four are not classified as such), there is alot of scope here. I will take longer for it to come into use for breast cancer, since it would have to be developed for some other cancer first.

There is also nothing to stop a company from tweaking the compound to get rid of some of the side effects/increase its efficiency and patent the tweaked compound.

So, I wouldn't worry. If I can think of these things, I am sure that the drugs industry can think of them as well.