Expensive

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not at all against a (practically) long patent period. In contrast, I believe drug companies would only have the incentive of developing new treatment for uncommon diseases when the potential profit is huge.

And, after all, it is a mathematical truth that treatment of rare diseases need to be expensive because much of the cost for the development of a new drug is fixed – no matter it is meant for common or orphan conditions. The cost (and the expected profit) to be shouldered by individual patient is therefore much higher for rare diseases.

The real problem is: Who should pay for the drug?

If you ask for my opinion five or ten years ago, my response would be simple: Some men are more equal than the others. For those who have the money, treatment is there. For the others, sorry, life is tough.

Frequent visitors of this site may remember I made an elaborated discussion on this problem some years ago. Go read http://ccszeto.blogspot.hk/2008/07/equal.html and related posts.

But, I’m not that sure now.