So, from the tone of your post, you support big pharma then? I only posted it since I wasn't sure those of you in the States got real news. Sorry.

YES YES THATS RIGHT
AND 3500 were killed by terrorists 3 YEARS AGO but we are never allowed to forget THAT.

[edit on 21-1-2007 by esecallum]

Not just that.
After that they used tax you paid them for Iraq invasion.
I wish you work harder and pay tax harder. And they send more youngster to Iraq to get killed!!!!!!
That's the American way!!!!!!!

Please stay on topic. If you wish to discuss Iraq or other items there are numerous threads to do so. If you wish to discuss the implications of this potential cancer breakthrough then you have found the right thread.

Thanks
FredT

This bears keeping an eye on. If they can selectivly target cancer cells, then you would have a reduction of the side effects that make cancer treatment so hard to endure. Right now, the cure is often worse than the disease. If they can avoid this it would be a huge boon to all those patients who have to undergo treatment

It would be economic suicide for the big pharma..

and also governments get taxes from those vast profits of a $1 trillion a year....


and dont forget the cancer patient industry...a cancer patient generate from $25000 to $250000 revenue...

566000 killed by cancer last year....IN USA ALONE!

multiply the figures...


25000 times 566000

=$10 billion to 100 billion..


now add the patients who did NOT die from cancer and survived the cancer treatment.....

Cynic:

That is a very interesting article. I read it a few days ago.

I think the issue is that it is unpatentable in its present form. Due to the astoundingly high costs of getting anything past the FDA, and due to the fact that the drug is cheap and unpatentable, you'll never see a drug company pay the hundreds of millions of dollars to get this filed.

I can see the point, they have to answer to their stockholders. It's not their job to spend major bucks to validate a new use for a generic. So it will stay an "off label" application, which means the physician will be liable legally for using it that way. Few will.

What's needed is some governmental agency that's tasked with bringing such drugs on-label. Maybe in league with some university that actually does the leg work. After all, the students in the university's pharma programs will eventually need to know how the process works. Why not let them contribute the work for free as part of their education, and let the government assist some number of these drugs to market financially?

It's a shame to let promising older drugs lay fallow like this.

Originally posted by Tom Bedlam
Cynic:

That is a very interesting article. I read it a few days ago.

I think the issue is that it is unpatentable in its present form. Due to the astoundingly high costs of getting anything past the FDA, and due to the fact that the drug is cheap and unpatentable, you'll never see a drug company pay the hundreds of millions of dollars to get this filed.

I can see the point, they have to answer to their stockholders. It's not their job to spend major bucks to validate a new use for a generic. So it will stay an "off label" application, which means the physician will be liable legally for using it that way. Few will.

What's needed is some governmental agency that's tasked with bringing such drugs on-label. Maybe in league with some university that actually does the leg work. After all, the students in the university's pharma programs will eventually need to know how the process works. Why not let them contribute the work for free as part of their education, and let the government assist some number of these drugs to market financially?

It's a shame to let promising older drugs lay fallow like this.

I was hoping that the Terry Fox Foundation (charitable research group here in Canada) would pick it up! One never knows, in any case our federal government should be doing it. After all, they are funding pot for the side effects of chemo. Maybe they think they will lose in the long run. We are damned in any case I think, more is the pity.

It will never happen...

only thing youcan do it is manufacture it yourself or in a 3rd world dump like india....which has no laws to stop this...