it’s a short synthetic peptide with unnatural aminoacids, sure in principle you could make it in completely automated way on SPPS but this is so expensive it’s really for research only. on scale you’d need normal wet synthesis, bucket scale or bigger and this is where things get tricky, especially purificationS and many of them, each intermediate needs one; then analysis and qc of it all. on top of that account for sourcing or synthesis of all these weird bits that you need, including multiple vendors and second options so that nothing gets halted because you’re out of some basic reagent or solvent
this shit is hard but also it’s opposite of career killer. i’m specifically not complaining
SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 month ago
Sure they can, but I’m pretty sure the companies who created them have like a decade before other companies are allowed to even think about creating generic versions of the same drug. Our patent and copyright systems are both completely fucking broken.
Makeitstop@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The ten years of exclusive control is such a shitty idea. I was on a medication that actually had that period extended beyond 10 years, and I struggled to get the medication I needed pretty much from the day it hit the market until a generic was finally made available. And even that was only after the company resisted hard enough to get a class action suit filed against them.
It would be so simple to change the patent laws so that getting the patent requires them to allow other manufacturers to produce the drug as well, and instead of exclusivity, they can get a 10% cut. Still plenty of incentive to patent a new drug, but now that incentive is only raising prices by 10% instead of 10,000%.
Shirasho@lemmings.world 1 month ago
Read the article. This is not a US product.
I agree with you though.
SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 month ago
True, but its about their operations in the US, which are required to follow US laws.
This means their patent for the drug in the US system means they can prevent it from being available to US consumers as a generic.
Also, the issue of the cost is related to how our government isn’t allowed to negotiate drug costs like others are.
The drug is made by a foreign company that has a presence in the US. They have a US headquarters for their US business.
Local laws have more to do with the issues raised in the article than the country of the original company.
That’s like saying T-Mobile is bound by German laws despite operating in the US because it is owned by Deutsche Telecom.