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Johnson & Johnson has granted Stop TB Partnership license to produce generic bedaquiline in low and middle-income countries
Link information
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- Title
- Global Drug Facility Update on Access to Bedaquiline
- Word count
- 113 words
This is an update to the post here about John Green's open letter to J&J. It looks like a breakthrough agreement was reached on the issue and generic bedaquiline will be produced for countries in need.
I noticed the update in the vlogbrothers video description and thought to post here. Often the resolution to these stories get less attention than the initial problem so I'm happy to post this!
Everyone in the last thread who thought this was just virtue signaling / a pointless protest should do some self-reflection tonight because John Green actually got stuff done with his open letter.
anyone who accuses John Green of virtue signaling can EABOD. the man, like his brother, is a treasure and a gift to humanity.
I mean, I’m glad that apparently less fortunate countries will be able to access generics, hopefully that prevents a lot of pain, misery, and even death.
Not terribly happy that I as an American am presumably still stuck in their walled-garden paying higher prices for longer though.
To give a sense of scale, there's about 8,000 cases of TB per year in the US according to the CDC. Of those, about 1% are drug resistant MDR-TB which might require bedaquiline treatment.
I appreciate you putting the scale and therefore context for the US, that is helpful.
If I’m doing my math correctly that’s 80 patients total in the US per year impacted by the decision and paying higher costs.
I guess where I’m scratching my head, then, is why it’s worth it at all to keep the walled garden. As you pointed out, the scale is fairly minuscule, all things considered. J&J can’t be making much money off of 80 patients in the US paying the higher price, I wouldn’t think. But it is still impacting those certain people more than others based on where they live. In fact, it’s almost a punishment for those patients to live in the country in which the treatment was (I presume) initially developed! I don’t know, just seems a bit asinine to me, if it makes moral and/or financial sense to open up the generic, then just go all the way and make the generic available to whole world.
Couple reasons spring to mind:
Companies guard their IP like jealous dragons guarding their hordes. E.g. Smaug wouldn't let one coin leave his domain. This is a mixture of corporate culture and how IP protection works in the US.
None of these US patients are like to die because of the higher prices, but a significant number in poor and middle income countries would so the PR problem is mostly mitigated. Why go further than you need to to assuage the public outrage?
Thanks for sharing :)
Anyone have any industry perspective on these types of negotiations? The update notes 'lengthy negotiations', and I'd assume that they aren't particularly quick and simple. Could the open letter/public outcry have any any influence on negotiations, or was this update mostly likely simply published early (or even, generously, purely coincidental in timing)?