High medication costs are not justified by industry spending on innovative work (research and development), contend specialists in The BMJ today.
Aris Angelis and colleagues point out that from 1999 to 2018, the world’s 15 largest biopharmaceutical companies spent more on selling, general, and regulatory activities (including marketing) than on research and development, and that most new drugs developed during this time period offered little clinical advantage over existing medicines.
By pulling together their spending, they say drug organizations “could give more inventive medications at reasonable costs,” and they call for government activity to support innovative work situated to meet general wellbeing needs.
They write that concerns about the costs of new medications have grown over the last ten years.In the United States, the assessed net costs of recently sent off physician-endorsed drugs increased from around $1,400 per year in 2008 to more than $150,000 per year in 2021, and, surprisingly, old and common medications have seen unusual cost increases recently.
“Given the amount spent on non-research and development activities and the fact that most new medications provide little or no therapeutic value, the biopharmaceutical industry might theoretically generate more medically beneficial innovation with its existing resources.”
The biopharmaceutical business has long contended that exorbitant costs are expected to support research and development for new prescriptions. Moreover, while the creators acknowledge that there are significant financial risks associated with releasing new medicines to the public, they express that a comparative examination of medication organization spending on items raises issues in this case.
For instance, freely accessible monetary reports from 1999 to 2018 show that the 15 biggest biopharmaceutical organizations had absolute incomes of $7.7tr.Over this period, they burned through $2.2tr on costs connected with sales, general, and regulatory exercises, and $1.4tr on research and development.
The greater part of similar organizations likewise spent more on really purchasing their own stocks, a practice known as stock buybacks, than on research and development during this period, note the creators, which brings up issues about responsibilities for important and unsafe biopharmaceutical research.
The legitimization of high medication costs to balance Research and development spending likewise overlooks the sizeable public interest in drug revelation and improvement, they add. This means that society may be paying for new medications twice, once through freely funded research and again through high item costs.
Furthermore, most new medications provide virtually no additional clinical value, which they make sense of.
For example, during the 1970s and 1980s, around 1 out of 6 (16%) new medications supported by the FDA offered significant and helpful increases. Examining medication assessment reports by well-being innovation evaluation bodies in France and Germany during the 2010s, however, suggests that most new medications offer virtually no additional clinical value, with only a small percentage offering significant or significant improvements.
Angelis, and that’s what partners recognize, on the positive side, that most items were a work in progress between 1997 and 2016 and designated novel systems of action, yet say there has also been a shift in focus from blockbuster drugs, which frequently focus on chronic illnesses and are sold in high volumes worldwide, to “nichebuster” drugs, which focus on uncommon illnesses or limited signs and can be charged high prices.
“Given the sum spent on non-innovative work exercises and that most new medications add next to zero restorative worth, in principle the biopharmaceutical business could create all the more medicinally significant advancement with its current assets,” they say.”This is probably not going to occur, in any case, without government mediation or guidelines along the lifecycle of new drugs.”
Thusly, they contend that states, strategy producers, drug controllers, wellbeing innovation evaluation bodies, and payers “need to reconsider the impetuses for significant biopharmaceutical advancement, establishing strategy and administrative conditions that will meet general wellbeing goals.”
“The world requires a truly value-based modern biological system for enhancing and rewarding improvements in wellbeing outcomes and populace wellbeing all through the lifecycle of new medicines,” they conclude.
More information: Aris Angelis et al, High drug prices are not justified by industry’s spending on research and development, The BMJ (2023). DOI: 10.1136/bmj-2022-071710
