Short Essay : Big Pharma : Me-Too Drugs Are Good!
In Our Daily Meds, Melody Peterson explains the detriment of “me-too” drugs – drugs chemically identical in function to a drug already on the market. She criticizes drug companies for “introducing dozens of copycat medicines that were barely distinguishable from one another,” thus ‘unnecessary.’ What Mrs. Peterson’s argument is lacking is an understanding of fundamental market economics. By introducing competitors, prices are kept reasonable; these ‘me-too’ drugs are what stabilize the market. Me-too drugs are ultimately beneficial to consumers.
Some people contend that me-too drug developers waste precious research time, money and their own intelligence making imitators when they could be searching for new cures. While searching for loopholes in the patent doctrine is beneficial for the company, this does little to help the many people who continue to suffer without cures or therapies to a myriad of diseases. Currently, one in two men and one in three women will be diagnosed with a form of cancer at some point in his or her life. As Peterson states in her book Our Daily Meds, “Between 1990 and 2004 the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research approved about 1,100 new drugs… only about 400 of them were actually ‘new.’” This means that 64% of the ‘new’ drugs were copycats. One drug called Propranolol, a beta blocker used to treat hypertension, has at least 6 imitators. Shouldn’t the resources being used to produce the many me-too drugs be used to find cures and therapies for the chronic diseases many of us will or are currently facing?
Although some think that me-too drugs are a waste of resources because they’re identical to products that are already available, me-too drugs actually create competition and, consequently, keep prices down. One of the central issues in BigPharma debate is the ‘cornering of the market,’ or the ability of drug companies to patent medications and sell them at their desired price for 20 years. When drug companies place high price tags on their new medications, many people who need the medication go without it because they cannot afford it. With the exception of lifestyle drugs, the demand of the majority of prescription drugs are inelastic in price; that is, changes in price generally do not affect the quantity of the product being supplied or demanded. This means that should the price of a drug a patient needs go up $100 every month, he would more than likely pay it in order to be healthy. Without me-too drugs regulating prices, big drug companies would charge as much as possible for their patented products. Fortunately, when the copycat drug makers create a chemically identical drug for a lower price, the big drug company is forced to lower its price or risk losing customers. This variance in market share is essential to the well being of consumers; with generic alternatives, consumers of all economic backgrounds are able to afford their medications. By cleverly maneuvering patent laws, copycat drugs are exemplar in their efforts to create a fair, competitive, functional market, and thus the me-too drugs are beneficial to consumers.
Image credit: http://remandopelomundo.wordpress.com/2010/10/25/industria-farmaceutica/
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