The Glade 4.0

This is a point we will just have to agree to disagree on.

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

Why is that?

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Because at the core, everything is reduced to economics and incentivization. Allocation of funds is not based on altruism, nor will it ever be. It is based on profit yields. The doctors and scientists doing the work may have personal ideals that run contrary to this occasionally, or even consistantly, but they too have to work within the framework of the system that provides them their sustinence.

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

That is true. However it is the doctors that tell the people allocating funds what they think can and cannot be done. The fund allocators generally don't know their *** from a hole in the ground by comparison, in regard to the actual science. Allocation of funds is not based on altruism but neither do profit yields exist in a vaccuum.

Everything is not, at its core, reduced to economics and incentivization. Those are major factors, but they are ultimately limited by what can and cannot be done, and it is engineers, scientists, and doctors that tell the managers that. Companies that try to make technical decisions based on bean-counting tend to produced **** products in very short order.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

As I said earlier, full imersion into free markets wouldn't suddenly make the impossible, possible. It wouldn't make teleporting a viable mode of travel, for example, when the technology doesn't exist. It would, however, change the massive amont of incentive to develop and improve motor traveland combustion engines as our society wouldn't be spending as much on the supporting infrastructure. While we wouldn't make teleportation possible through this act, we would find out if it was.

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

We might or might not find out if it was, since at any given point we either A) know if something is possible or B) don't know if it is possible or not. We can never assume we have a complete understanding of all physical principles.

Of more immediate relevance is, again, the lack of a timescale. How long would it take us to find any given thing out?

Finally, freedom of the market does not, in and of itself, necessarily incentivise anything. It incentivises that for which there is demand, but people only demand that which they know is reasonably possible. If drug companies are not now pursuing cures because treatments are more profitable, I don't see why that would change under a less-regulated market.

I don't see anyting wrong with increasing the overall freedom of the market, but as I see it trying to tie patent to R&D costs is excessively complicated and 100% tax protection is not as beneficial as simply reducing taxation to more reasonable levels.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

The goal is not to impose any artificial time lines, but to create an economic enviroment in which a naturally occuring timeline might have come into being. We can't know how long something will take us, but we do know that innovation is exponential once you cross various thresholds.

As to freedom of the market, companies developing new drugs and procedures would devote more resources towards cures, because for them, lack of ability to make profitable business models built around treatment opposed to cures would drive them that way.

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

If you want "cures," you need to shatter the entitlement complex when it comes to vaccines. Technically those aren't cures but they're seriously almost as good, and it's vastly more likely that we could come up with an AIDS/cancer vaccine or some kind of preventative treatment, than an actual cure for these diseases.

The problem is every company knows there's no money to be made there, as minor breakthroughs generate nothing, (unlike small improvements in palliative treatments, which you can re-patent and get another 20 years on) and major breakthroughs will simply be taken from you. Seriously, if Pfizer released a breast cancer vaccine and wanted to charge $10,000 for it, do you think that would fly, even if $10k was a fair price given the research costs? The government would take it in weeks and cut the price to something "fair" amidst massive public outcry about how it's not fair that anyone who can't put up $10k has to die of breast cancer.

What are those thresholds? That's a very vague reference. Moreto the point, why will innovation necessarily continue to be exponential?

Timelines are not artificial at all. Pursuing an action because it might have a benefit at some undefined point in the future is very poor cost-benefit analysis.



I don't see how they would lack the ability to make a profitable buisness model around treatments. All they would need to do is keep making treatments instead of cures.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

You don't know that the government would do that, nor do you know that PFizer would need to charge such a sum to make a profit.. and in any case, $10,000 for a cancer cure is incredibly cheap compared to ongoing care for it.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

The problem with patent isn't so much "how much this drug costed to develop" but more "how much did we spend in the area of research before we discovered something remotely workable". Companies spend a lot of money on people with ideas, unfortunately most of these (last figure I saw was 98%?) aren't feasible, or we do not yet have the technology to further explore, or a billion other reasons. Those that do work, also carry the burden of these.

To the point with responsibility. Regulatory affair departments within the company are held legally responsible if there are any 'fraud' associated with the drugs and their labels, however the legal chain stops there and sales are not bound by any laws or regulations not to lie. Personally I'd like to see medical/medicine sales people sign the same type of paper I had to when I started Reg.

I also believe the doctors need to be held accountable in this instance. If a drug is to be used off label, a consent form must be signed by the one taking it, with all risk and benifits clearly stated on the form. I'm aware that this is normal practice here but not sure about over there.

While a 20 year patent might seem like a long time to normal people, it is considered a relatively short time in the med industry where a clinical study could take 1-2 years easily and the government usually takes just as long before they even read your submission. If you want to promote scientific growth and research, the patent should be extended instead of shortened. As it stands now, it is too short to make back any reasonable amount of return.

Umm.

How do you vaccinate for cancer, exactly?

Remember that you can really only vaccinate against viruses- most vaccines against cancer would straight out kill you, or at least send you into a lifetime of immunosuppressant therapy- you'd be telling the body to attack itself.

I realize you were just using it to prove a point, but....

HPV is the only known cancer causing virus- as others develop, vaccines may hit them up too. But antiviral therapy is very good for most of those, as well.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

I've read about several promising cancer vaccines that use retroviruses to reprogram your immune system to attack the cancer cells, or even just vaccinations that sensitize the immune system to the cancer cells so you never get cancer in the first place.

There are no distinct differences in cell walls that make cancer cells different from others- hence the continuous problem in targeting cancer.

You can't preferentially sensitize the immune system to cancerous cells over regular cells. And the use of retroviruses will never, ever be passed by the FDA- too high of a rate of side effects. Not only that, but we aren't close to having the knowledge to use retroviruses to reprogram anything other than to remove specific mutations.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

Well there is a difference, they cancer cells don't have any check on growth - if there were no difference they wouldn't be cancer cells.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

But that difference isn't something that our immune systems can see. Our immune systems don't run hashes on DNA to look for corruption, our T cells check for blacklisted antigens on the cell walls of stuff they run into. Cancer cells present the same antigens as healthy ones.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

MUSC article on DNA and RNA viral cancers.

I started looking because I recall the same information that X alluded to... using a virus to "kill" the cancer, but for some reason, I thought it was based upon using a virus carrying the growth suppressor gene into the cancer site to "turn off" the cancer, which would have no effect on healthy cells. So while targeted in the effect, it is not targeted to a specific cell.

Yeah but thats not the same as no difference.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Don't want to pay the money to save your own life? Drop dead.


That logic is so **** spurious as to be laughable. I mean, really. We aren't talking about a genetic condition you had no say in. We're talking about a community-acquired disease. **** you if you can't afford the treatment.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

You have a right to life, which is you have a right that other's wont willfully act to end your life. You don't have a right to make others pay to continue your life for that is making a slave out of them and thus infringing on their rights.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Read my post again, Elmo-

I said there was no distinct difference in cell walls- exactly what Kaffis posted.

And the problem is, there is usually not a single, traceable problem in cancer- there are multiple mutations and deviations from the norm.

If it was easily traceable, we'd have 'cured it' by now.

Viral cancers we can certainly do something about- as well as limiting exposure to other specifically known mutagens.

As to using growth suppressor gene therapy, there is the problem that there is not a single switch that is on/off in cancer/non-cancer cells. It may help in some cancers and not others, as well as in some individuals and not others.

There are combination of similar factors that are found frequently in cancer cells, but the list is not the same for each individual cell.

Often it isn't something easy to probe that is/isn't there in a normal cell, but is instead there in a higher/lower level than in a normal cell.

Some problems have been tracked down to single amino acid mutations in protein-protein interface regions of Transcription Factor/Promoter pairs for regulatory genes.

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Darksiege: You are not a god damned vulcan homie.

That is not the point. If the availability of the drug was based on people's ability to pay, they would have to charge less, or nobody would be able to afford it. But it isn't. If you can't afford the drug, the hospital has to buy it for you anyway. So the drug company can make up any number it wants for the price, as long as they're not bankrupting the hospital they're going to get it.

that sentence is contradicting in itself...



See I totally agree with that, but my lovability points take a negative hit everytime I voice it =P

Unfortunately emotion over rides logic when it comes to "think of the children"

Lydiaa you gained at least 18 adorabalicious points with that position.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Can I spend it on my other attributes? or maybe exchange it for chocoaltes? I'm running low, only 2 bunnies left >.>

Sales start this thursday though, i'm looking forward to snatching those easter eggs with caramel center that they only sell around easter ^-^