U.S. to set up plan aimed at allowing prescription drugs from Canada

Re:U.S. to set up plan aimed at allowing prescription drugs ... by fuzz4lyfe on Wednesday July 31, 2019 @02:33PM (#20576945)

If marketing was not yielding a return why would they do it? Presumably spending $1.00 to market a drug returns at least $1.01 in profits. If that is true then a lower marketing budget would result in a lower R and D budget provided you keep all the percentages the same.

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Re:U.S. to set up plan aimed at allowing prescription drugs ... by Scoundreller on Wednesday July 31, 2019 @03:00PM (#20577163)

The point being made was that, while US prices are higher, they may not outweigh profits from EU sales.

Selling your product for 50% more in the US may not be more profitable than selling in EU where your marketing costs are a lot lower.

Of course you’d sell in all markets where you can, but the claim was that US profits > EU profits because US prices > EU prices.

Also, there’s R&D/education that’s really marketing. E.g. advisory panels, grants to the “right” organizations, agencies or researchers

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Re:U.S. to set up plan aimed at allowing prescription drugs ... by mikeash on Wednesday July 31, 2019 @04:39PM (#20578291)

A lot of marketing is a prisoners’ dilemma. There is little if any gain from the steady state where everyone does it, but you have to do it because if you don’t then your competitors will and they’ll eat you alive.

In which case you could kill this stupid marketing budget without much effect on R&D by outlawing drug advertising.

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Re:U.S. to set up plan aimed at allowing prescription drugs ... by Scoundreller on Wednesday July 31, 2019 @04:52PM (#20578411)

That’s why they get together and make a bunch of rules about what is “ethical” marketing.

In reality, the established players halve their marketing expense and make it difficult for any upstarts.

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