TOPIC:

I've been reading couple of statements/interviews from Gilead's managers that were communicated in the last weeks and my understaning is that G's main focus at the moment is to identify new opportunities for drugs for which mergers and acquisitions are the key. I do not recall to have read something about mass production/treatment of HCV patients or about real investments done in R&D.
It sounds to me that G is hunting the companies that are doing the real research activity. This makes me think whether antitrust laws would / should apply.

Our Republican Congress likes trusts and big business. They get a lot of money from them.
I wouldn't be surprised if Gilead was spending a lot of money researching what 1st world diseases they need to come up with a cure for next.
That and marketing. You can't turn on a TV, pick up a magazine or visit a website, like Hepmag, without being assaulted by Harvoni ads. You don't see that from Abbvie.
We are so used to Viagra and Prilosec ads in the US that it's hard for my American brain to understand some countries, like Australia, don't allow the practice.
I guess it's hard for most of the world to understand us gun crazed hooligans the US. Maybe Trump will fix that.
I don't know.
m

mgalbrai wrote: Our Republican Congress likes trusts and big business. They get a lot of money from them.
I wouldn't be surprised if Gilead was spending a lot if money researching what 1st world diseases they need to come up with a cure for next.
That and marketing. You can't turn on a TV, pick up a magazine or visit a website, like HeoMag, without being assaulted by Harvoni ads. You don't see that from Abbvie.
We are so used to Viagra and Prilosec ads in the US that it's hard for my American brain to understand some countries, like Australia, don't allow the practice.
I guess it's hard for most of the world to understand us gun crazed hooligans the US. Maybe Trump will fix that.
I don't know.
m

Our Democrats are no less guilty. Members of both parties are far to busy stealing with both hands to do the people's business.

Mike, if you and I ever come across a politician who doesn't have their hand out, it is because they are either asleep, or dead.

If the Democrats controlled Congress, I would have said the exact same thing.
All I do know is this: With one directive from the president, Customs and the FDA could end the generic flow into the US. They both answer to the Executive.
When the next president takes office, he or she will have the same ability.
Scary.
m

Couldn't agree more!

Earlier, I commented on another thread that we (in the US), are being forced to pay $94,000 for a course of HCV treatment that costs $100 to produce, and we are mortgaging our children's future to pay for it.

This thread is probably an even more important place to make that statement, again.

Shunning corporate branded HCV medications for generics isn't just the intelligent choice, its a civic duty.

Yes, because if insurers and the government covered every single HCV patient at their current "discounted" price from Gilead, it would force a dramatic rise in insurance premiums and taxes.
HCV suffers are being held for ransom.
M

Gilead just published the Q2/2016 sales results.

Couple of highlights (usually Q2 is the best quarter for sales):

- Product Sales
Total product sales for the second quarter of 2016 were $7.7 billion compared to $8.1 billion for the same period in 2015. Product sales for the second quarter of 2016 were $4.9 billion in the U.S., $1.6 billion in Europe, $619 million in Japan and $531 million in other locations. Product sales for the second quarter of 2015 were $5.6 billion in the U.S., $2.0 billion in Europe, $62 million in Japan and $515 million in other locations.
- HCV product sales, which consist of Harvoni® (ledipasvir 90 mg/sofosbuvir 400 mg), Sovaldi® (sofosbuvir 400 mg) and Epclusa® (sofosbuvir 400 mg/velpatasvir 100 mg), were $4.0 billion compared to $4.9 billion for the same period in 2015 primarily due to a decline in sales of Harvoni.


I think there is not much to comnent, apart from the fact that with a market of 150 000 000 patients worldwide, the HCV sales are dropping.... A basic rule of profit says that you can make nice profit going to mass distribution and lowering the price.
P.s. How many zeros are in the exercise:
150 000 000 x 1 000?
If you answer "more than 20 zeros" you have high chances to get hired in a profitable pharma company :d (this was a poor attempt to make a joke ... )

My experience has always been that it doesn't matter how good a product is if no one can afford to buy it. That 20% drop in sales tells me that fewer people are being treated, and probably the net death toll from HCV will rise by a similar percentage as a result.

You could almost infer the direct cost of greed in human lives lost with that number.

It could mean more product sold at lower prices. I'd be interested to see sales figures for countries with government subsidies.

That would be nice, but with the rate of infection climbing steadily - they'll likely hang on to that margin until hell freezes over, or the wheels fall off.

Remember that while insurers are now required by law to cover everyone in the US, Big Pharma is not constrained in its pricing. The rate of seriously ill will continue to climb, and Big Pharma will continue to milk that curve for every last penny.

The great thing in the present times is that the information spreads much much faster via www.

Regarding the prices of the products, as long as the products are dedicated / intended to be sold in mass, the price will decrease in time in order to reach the large scale levels of distribution. Take whatever example you want where the product contained a high level of innovation (cars, computer/notebooks) - the initial price was very high, few were able to afford it, but decreased over time in order to reach large scale of distribution. The so called IP rights which should guarantee a high degree of innovation turns unfortunately today to be a mechanism to make huge amounts of money and slowing down the large scale distribution....Things may not and for sure will not remain like this. No matter how much greed might exist, there will come one day the moment of time when the governments will see that the IP laws need to be revised and the "windows" by which Big Pharma makes money will become smaller.

See also this from Nasdaq: www.nasdaq.com/article/gilead-gild-stock...es-guidance-cm654446
Cheers,
RHF

The type of predatory pricing we see with drugs like Sovaldi and Harvoni is a major factor in 'Obama Care' (our US quasi public health insurance system) coming apart at the seams.

US Insurers are taking in more money than ever before, and US citizens are now forced to purchase insurance or face steep fines. Big Insurers were drooling all over themselves at the prospect of creating and benefiting from a completely captive market - until reality set in.

Now the Big Insurers themselves are 'opting out', leaving the Obama Care exchanges in droves and running over one another to get to the exits

Realistically, some of the decline in Gileads sales is likely due to the loss of Insurers which have already left the Obama Care exchanges. However, with insurance rates now skyrocketing between 20% and 30% per year, the number of Americans who can afford the non-subsidized rates is relatively small compared to the vast majority of Americans who are now trapped within the taxpayer subsidized Obama Care scheme.

Market forces will most likely eventually bring the entire system crashing down (wheels falling off, crashing an burning, completely derailed). The endgame for the current administration is to create the circumstances for the collapse of private healthcare so that the entire system can be scrapped, and replaced with a European style 'single payer' government run system.

So RHF, eventually the US Goverment will "come to the rescue" - to solve a problem they custom engineered to begin with. In the meantime there will be a great deal of unnecessary pain and suffering, and a lot of Americans caught up in this political quicksand will die.

None of this is anything we the 'little people' have any control over at the macro level right now. The best we can do for ourselves and our fellow citizens is to look out for our own well being, and spread the word about generic DAAs as quickly and effectively as possible.