AIDS expert has theory on vaccine's delay

[kweerwolf]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- In an unusually candid admission, the federal chief of AIDS research says he believes drug companies don't have an incentive to create a vaccine for the HIV and are likely to wait to profit from it after the government develops one.

That means the government has had to spend more time focusing on the processes that drug companies ordinarily follow in developing new medicines and bringing them to market.

"We had to spend some time and energy paying attention to those aspects of development because the private side isn't picking it up," Dr. Edmund Tramont testified in a deposition in a recent employment lawsuit obtained by The Associated Press.

Tramont is head of the AIDS research division of the National Institutes of Health, and he predicted in his testimony that the government will eventually create a vaccine. He testified in July in the whistleblower case of Dr. Jonathan Fishbein.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/conditions/12/25/aids.vaccine.ap/index.html

[BattyDem]

1. That theory makes sense

Drug companies make billions of dollars from AIDS treatment drugs. A vaccine/cure would kill the profit margin, so why would they pursue it? :eyes: :grr:

[Warpy]

2. Most breakthrough drugs are developed in the US under NIH

grants to universities. Whatever they discover is licensed to a drug company for final testing and then a 17 year patent.

Drug company research is mainly geared toward finding a "me too" version of a breakthrough drug, something altered chemically so that it still works the same as the original drug, but which is patentable as something new and different.

In some cases, those "me too" drugs have been superior to the original. Cases in point would be the second generation cholesterol lowering drugs that didn't have the GI upset of the original Mevacor and the second generation ACE inhibitors that lacked all sorts of nasty side effects that the orignial Captopril had.

Don't kid yourself that those TV adverts showing intrepid white coated researchers are dedicated to turning up the next big thing. They're not. Universities do that stuff on public money. Drug companies can't afford to research anything but a sure thing, which is why they concentrate on duplicate drugs rather than breakthroughs.

[Conservativesux]

3. Many cholesterol lowering drugs do have serious side effects...

Crestor and Lipitor being the worst.

[demodonkey]

4. My Dad, a diabetic, always said there would never be a cure for diabetes..

...he said the drug companies made too much money off testing supplies, syringes, and insulin, not to mention all the drugs and treatments for side effects of diabetes.

:-(