Yeah–without financial incentive, no innovator will explore and research just for the heck of it. Think of those greedy bastards–Banting & Best–who discovered insulin. They made a veritable FORTUNE when they discovered/isolated insulin! And without sufficient incentive, they would probably just have gone out and mowed the grass, right?

(BTW, B&B licensed insulin for $1 . . . so much for your economic theory. Innovators, scientists, explorers . . . they do the work because they WANT to do the work, it is what drives them. On the other hand, if they need to live, and sell their life to a corporation –we ALL know what drives corporations, don’t we?)

The costs involved in “innovation” have gotten out of hand, not to mention the fact that if you ask anyone in Pharma who knows anything, they will always “overstate” the cost of innovation.

You actually think Thailand is being abusive? Interesting…

Maybe what these countries are trying to make us do is focus and use our intellectual might to figure out how to bring these life saving/extending drugs to market in a much more efficient manner.

Maybe we should stop the name calling and game of smoke and mirrors that distract from the real issues - if we need drugs at all then we need them to be accessible by all people.

BTW, the grammar school bathroom thing - honestly how can that possibly be an analogy used in the context of preserving human life?

However, I am in favor of innovation, and when a country abuses its right to compulsory license it gives other countries the wrong impression of what the TRIPS treaty implied when it include that language.

It is like the teacher in grammar school always said, “If I let you goto the bathroom now, I will have to let everyone go…” Once one country does this consistently, others will follow suit, and soon patents will mean nothing. Without protection of intellectual property, no one is going to put in the hard time and effort to develop new and innovative drugs.

And then where will new AIDS drugs for the Thai people come from?

Their currency, the bhat, is currently at about .37 to the American dollar. Not hard to see why buying drugs to keep their citizens healthy is more of a hardship for them then it is us.

We are missing the bigger opportunity here in Thailand. In spite of the coup last year and the change in government. Look at what the health minister is trying to do with regards to prevention. Lately he has banned all alcohol advertising and even though it has not yet become law, the media are following through (yeah, yeah, I know what you are thinking - but still). Thailand has made major strides in eradicating illegal drugs produced in their country. We should all get together and provide incentives to them i.e. reduced costs on legal drugs, in order to completely reduce the illegal drugs produced. Why don’t we offer that to all these countries that produce illegal drug crops? Yes, 95% of its citizens are Buddhists, and that is why prevention programs will probably have a higher rate of success.

So, here we are in some of the wealthiest countries, with our grossly obese citizens, smoking, and drinking their health away and we want to wreak havoc over in Thailand because they are trying to do something about it by launching prevention campaigns and trying to access cheaper drugs for their own citizens.

Is it just me?