This might be one of the most ridiculous government schemes EVER!
Swimming with sharks
What’s the easiest way to get rid of $1 billion?
Ding ding ding! We have a winner!
And here’s the really exciting news: That billion is ALL tax dollars! Dropped straight down the garbage chute!
For this we can thank the busy folks at the National Institutes of Health. They’ve got a big plan for a brand new NIH center called National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS).
Okay, we like science. And we’re all for advancing science. And we know what “National Center” means. But “Translational”? What’s that about?
Don’t ponder it too long. It serves as a buzz word that will help keep the public from understanding the true nature of NCATS.
But out here in the non-government, non-hogwash world, here’s what the name of the new center would be: National Center for Developing New Drugs for the Drug Industry.
That’s right–100% crazy but true–your government is going to devote $1 billion MINIMUM in a half-baked attempt to do the drug industry’s work.
What could possibly go wrong!?
His own private Idaho
NIH officials are concerned about the lack of new drugs in the Big Pharma pipeline.
The drug industry invested around $45 billion in new drug research in 2009. But that year, as with other recent years, the results were underwhelming. And yet, those cockeyed optimists at NIH hope to invest a very small fraction of that and do a better job.
According to a New York Times article, NIH officials acknowledge that they might not succeed where private industry has failed, “but they say doing nothing is not an option.”
Okay, first off, doing nothing IS an option, and it’s an especially GOOD option because they’re risking (and, oh boy, are they risking!) a cool billion on an experiment that’s way outside their skill set.
And secondly, the yearly industry investment of $45 billion doesn’t quite qualify as “doing nothing.”
Obviously, NIH officials can’t be missing these glaring realities. So what’s REALLY going on here?
My hunch: It’s a vanity project.
The Times notes that NCATS is a “signature effort” Dr. Francis S. Collins, the director of NIH. Dr. Collins directed the NIH Human Genome Project, and he’s one of many (me included) who believe that genetics will probably dominate the world of health care in the 21st century.
The difference between me and Dr. Collins is that he’s specifically focused on the idea of developing new drugs based on genetic research–presumably research that he’s played a large role in creating.
But his vision is stalled on the launch pad.
Drug makers have already invested “tens of billions of dollars” to develop drugs from gene-related research. TENS OF BILLIONS! Adding up to a big goose egg. And yet Dr. Collins believes his team can turn all that around with a single billion.
And here’s why they won’t…
Dr. Collins is looking at the future of medicine. But drug companies are looking at the future of Big Pharma. HUGE difference! And that difference is bottom line profits.
Sources:
“Federal Research Center Will Help Develop Medicines” Gardiner Harris, New York Times, 1/22/11, nytimes.com
“What Innovation? NIH Moves into Drug Development” Ed Silverman, Pharmalot, 1/24/11, pharmalot.com
