Drug companies have invested zillions of dollars into developing, testing and documenting the different drugs before they hit the market. It is only fair and square that they have some revenue on that investment. The dynamics of capitalism creates an opportunistic playing field where the bright guys make a lot of money. I'm happy with that. I think it is hard to find someone who actually disagree with this...


But capitalism needs boundaries and regulations. If you don't enforce fair, but strict rules the same opportunistic dynamics encourages finding sneaky and dirty ways of increasing revenue. To stop that you need independent institutions capable of calling any bluff the big corporations care to make. If you don't you are entirely on the mercy of big corporations and their marketing departments.


So, it's not about stopping big medical firms from making money. It is about funding a sufficient amount of medical research outside those firms. Benefits include

a) An independent source of information.

b) Lots of interesting results into topics and areas that the big med corps won't touch because they lack money making potential. I don't blame big corps for not using resources on stuff with zero revenue... which means someone else must do it for the benefit of all humankind.

c) EDIT: It offers an alternative carrier path for those bright heads who would like to do medical research outside of the big companies. They won't work for slave contracts thought, hence the need for some independent funding.



P.s. I highly recommend Ben Goldacre's book and blog
bad science . Being a medical doctor, most of his examples are medical, but the principles of science are universal. Although Goldacre has some pretty bad examples of drug companies trying to design trials in a way that make them look good and obfuscates side effects, the most hilarious examples are from the "alternative" side of medicine...