Re:Ask HN: How to raise funds for rare disease research?
by mschuster91 on Tuesday February 08, 2022 @05:58AM
(#30257023)
> Won't it be hard to find investors if you do that?
Better that than paying negative interest for German 20 year bonds, if you ask me.
> Universities are great at many things, including research, but based on my experiences (science PhD two decades ago in a research group which worked on anti-infectives) the scientists there aren't necessarily very good - or even actually interested - in development as such. We partnered fairly closely with $bigPharma at the time, and they funded a fair chunk of our work.
Agreed, universities have historically not been involved into the development part. But that is not a given dogma that can't be changed - the government could fund the establishment of development departments.
Alternatively, international governments could establish cooperative efforts to develop pharmaceutical compounds. Rare diseases and the decline of available reserve antibiotics are a global problem affecting every country on Earth just the same.
Better that than paying negative interest for German 20 year bonds, if you ask me.
> Universities are great at many things, including research, but based on my experiences (science PhD two decades ago in a research group which worked on anti-infectives) the scientists there aren't necessarily very good - or even actually interested - in development as such. We partnered fairly closely with $bigPharma at the time, and they funded a fair chunk of our work.
Agreed, universities have historically not been involved into the development part. But that is not a given dogma that can't be changed - the government could fund the establishment of development departments.
Alternatively, international governments could establish cooperative efforts to develop pharmaceutical compounds. Rare diseases and the decline of available reserve antibiotics are a global problem affecting every country on Earth just the same.