Drugged Out

What?  The team from Failure - the Podcast (a/k/a Innovation Blab) has solved the drug problem?  Cured the common cold?  Ended all plagues and epidemics?  Discovered a magic elixir for aging politicians?  Sadly,  no, no, no, and no.

We did, however, stumble upon the dark underbelly of Big Pharma.  Making that stuff isn’t easy.  We get it.  It’s not like snapping together Legos. You have to try millions of compounds.  Some you make.  Some you find:  Martian asteroids, bottom of the ocean, lizard venom, bee wings, eye of newt.  If we were to wax political, it’s not unlike finding a Veep who hates cat-loving, childless woman:  you gotta look under a lot of rocks.   

The guest of today’s podcast has 25+ years of experience at that — Big Pharma, not vetting running mates nor torturing political metaphors.  Imran Nasrullah specialized in drug licensing and business development.  He tell tales that few know or want to believe.  One in ten thousand, for example.  Those are the numbers.  9,999 candidate drugs tested and rejected for one that makes it to the next stage-gate.

Do you remember Adam Smith, the 18th-century economist and philosopher? Let’s just say that when it comes bringing product to a market that’s largely defined by 3rd-party payers (read: insurance companies), Smith’s “invisible hand” works in odd ways.  The most efficacious drugs aren’t necessarily the ones that either the makers want to make or payers want to pay for.

Is there a better way?  Who knows.  The UK and Canada have not fared better with a single-payer health care system.  And, it remains to be seen whether China, which just announced a cure for diabetes, will have the economic wherewithal to bring that to market other than, perhaps, for medical tourism.  Getting a face lift in Mexico is so last year. 

Join Jeff, David and Mark wrestle with Imran Nasrullah’s picture of a dark  aspect of the U.S. health care system which, like democracy, seems the worst there could be, except for all others that have been tried.