There’s a new white paper worth reading. It comes from Alberto Mingardi of the Bruno Leoni Institute in Italy and leverages the current American debate over drug importation to address some more fundamental and troubling issues — sustainability of global pharmaceutical development. Heres a sample. The full paper can be found at http://brunoleoni.servingfreedom.net/BP/
Free-riding (on drug discovery and development) by European countries does appear a markedly unsustainable course: ironically, the price controls in force in almost every development economies endangers the American exception. Pressures on the United States to take the course of socialized medicine come from many quarters and some steps in that directions have already been taken. The prospect of a “globalization” of socialized medicine emphasizes all the flaws of a situation in which Europe is content with living off the American golden eggs goose. When the fact is taken into account that in 1998 as much as 33 of the best-selling (and, therefore, most appreciated) drugs were of American origin, it is clear that the very future of an innovative healthcare industry depends on that goose. Beyond any moral issues, the danger exists that, if the United States will achieve further European-style legislative “progress,” that overstretched goose might lay her last egg.
