Those tiny black dots are nanobots delivering a lethal blow to a cancerous cell, effectively killing it. The first trial on humans has been a success, with no side-effect.
Faster, please. I wonder if innovations like this will continue under ObamaCare?
I think this kind of stuff will continue under ObamaCare if it is less expensive than the current treatments.
Does this fall under “medical devices?” If so, it might not survive.
It’ll happen. You’ll just have to go to Mexico to get it.
@Flight-ER-Doc: I think what Rand fears is that the research into this will stop because of Obamacare.
Rich people get cancer, too. Sam Walton was the richest man on Earth when he died of cancer. Even if the government doesn’t fund the research, someone will.
Research like this will still happen, but at a MUCH slower pace. The real question is who will be putting up the multiple billions to get this basic research through clinical trials for FDA approval. Without a profit incentive there isn’t much incentive for a drug company to put that much capital at risk.
It’s an interesting question. Is it a drug, or it it robotic surgery? If the latter, no FDA approval needed…
This is in the FDA approval process as a IND (Investigational New Drug). Calling a nanoparticle a BOT would be guaranteed to raise FDA hackles if it was the company doing it instead of some journalist. Nanodevices have an entirely different regulatory pathway at the FDA.
http://www.calandopharma.com/about-calando/pdf/Calando%20Clinical%20Profile%20Mar%2019,%202010.pdf
Europe spends similar amounts on health care that we in the u.s. do.
Yet they are way underrepresented in new medical technology of all kinds.
could it be the lack of profit motive?
Yet they are way underrepresented in new medical technology of all kinds.
could it be the lack of profit motive?
Oh, bollocks.
Which new medical technologies specifically are they under-represented in?
Likewise, drug research, again, nice rhetoric not supported by the facts. There’s some major players in the field working out of the UK largely funded by the NHS where they can plan and predict cash flow for research better.
But keep trying. It’s, as ever, fun to watch.
One of the makers of the most compact and fastest-working blood-glucose testers is Bayer, a French company if I’m not mistaken. But since glucometers are themselves hardly a new thing, I’m not sure the smaller-faster attribute represents “new” technology or just a Euro version of postwar Japan’s riffing on existing tech.
FWIW, Bayer’s glucometers aren’t pieces of cheap-ass crap…
Given the research was done by Mark E. Davis, et al., of Caltech, a non-profit institution of learning whose research is largely funded by NIH/NSF, it’s hard to see what difference Romneycare would make, or why the profit motive is relevant.
Oh, and Bayer AG is a German company, named for its founder, Friedrich Bayer.
“It’s an interesting question. Is it a drug, or it it robotic surgery? If the latter, no FDA approval needed…”
You’re not at all the first to consider that question:
http://jolt.richmond.edu/v16i2/Article4.pdf
http://www.stlr.org/html/volume4/miller.pdf
Daveon,
State your evaluation function, my first choice:
The Nobel prize in medicine.
Please count europeans that did ther Nobel research in the U.S as US based. Must also count the Austrailian winners that won who did their research before Aus went to socialized medicine,.
Lets try some other notable inventions/procedures:
MRI
Pet Scan
Organ Transplants
Ultrasound
Hip Replacement….
Coronary Bypass
Heart Lung Machine
Lasik
Modern cochlear implant.
Basic Stem Cell research
Gene specific Cancer drugs.
Please list all the Medical inventions that have come from Europe since the creation of socialized medicine in Europe.
I’m talking new developments, the germans clearly have a good engineering culture where they can refine an invention, but even there you will find the highest tech most expensive medical advances are first marked sold in the U.S. There are a number of large European medical companies, that largely do research by buying up promising smaller companies, almost all of which were formed in the U.S.
Paul
It will only be available for those with “special” health plans…. maybe like those the pandering princes of the Potomac (congress) has available to them.
Thanks.
Daveon,
Paul’s point is not literally true, but it is not false either. Europe has a significant pharma industrial base, but… only because it has enjoyed the ability to reap most of its profits by selling its wares in the U.S. under U.S. rules at U.S. prices supporting U.S. profit margins. As Obamacare would largely make the U.S. the largest European country, from a regulatory and incentives standpoint, Paul’s essential point is well-taken. If all the liberal boomer twits who voted for Obama truly understood that the long-term effect of Obamacare is that they get to die a decade or two earlier than they might have under the status quo ante, I suspect there would already be 221 corpses hanging from the light standards along Pennsylvania Avenue. As things stand, it seems the Tea Partiers will have to give them back their stolen longevity by canceling Obamacare starting this Fall. Many of the aforesaid beneficiaries will, no doubt, fight their benefactors tooth and nail in the process. I’m guessing you will probably number yourself among these.
“Europe has a significant pharma industrial base, but… only because it has enjoyed the ability to reap most of its profits by selling its wares in the U.S. under U.S. rules at U.S. prices supporting U.S. profit margins.”
“Citation needed,” as the Wikipedia kids say. That is, are you basing this on actual data, or hearsay, or urban legend, or…?
Do you have the annual report of any medically-related company showing such a pattern of 51% of their global profits (“most”) coming from the US, while the bulk of their sales comes from the rest of the world? For that matter, do you have the annual report of any medically-related company with such a global sales pattern that doesn’t show a substantial profit? (I’ll wave my hands wildly here and say more than 5%.)
Bayer AG reports for 2009 (since they’ve been mentioned) an aggregate global profit margin of about 21%. Working out the numbers, for “most” of their profits to be coming from North America, the split would have to be a margin of 37% here, and about 15% in the rest of the world. The margin for the rest of the world is lower than North America, yes, but 15% is nothing to sneeze at, and many US companies profess envy at such a thing.
I realized I could have written more clearly.
“Even assuming your premise is correct, working out the numbers…”
That is, there’s no evidence the premise is correct. But even assuming it is, 15% ain’t a bad after-tax profit margin to have… And it would certainly be enough to fund R&D.
Paul Breed: “State your evaluation function, my first choice:
The Nobel prize in medicine.”
Okay. Here’s the official list of such winners.
Since the relevant point is whether such research is publicly or privately funded, please identify the winners who were working at strictly private-sector labs. Bell Labs would be an example; I’m not sure what the life sciences equivalent would be. Without one, direct employees of US firms such as Pfizer, Merck, Medtronic, etc. will have to do.
I haven’t been through the entire list, but in the last 20 years (2009-1989), not one recipient meets that criterion, regardless of country. They’ve all been from academic research departments (notably the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the Univ. of Washington here in Seattle {2004, 2001, 1992, 1990}, said the local booster) or hospitals, regardless of country.
According to the National Science Foundation, the Federal government accounts for about 60% of the funding for such academic research (note especially Figure 05-02). “Industry” accounts for only about 5% of such funding, squinting at the graph. (The remainder is comprised of other levels of government funding than federal.)
So, again… Given that nationwide Romneycare isn’t affecting any of that, what would the argument be that such research is somehow endangered by Romneycare?
Paul Breed:
“Lets try some other notable inventions/procedures:
MRI
Pet Scan
Organ Transplants
Ultrasound
Hip Replacement….
Coronary Bypass
Heart Lung Machine
Lasik
Modern cochlear implant.
Basic Stem Cell research
Gene specific Cancer drugs.”
Not wanting to comment until I’d researched this long list, I can now say:
* LASIK had one step on its long path where a private researcher made a major contribution: “The introduction of lasers in refractive surgeries stemmed from Rangaswamy Srinivasan’s work. In 1980, Srinivasan, working at IBM Research Lab, discovered that an ultraviolet Excimer laser…”, etc. However, as it says here, “Though the excimer laser had been used for many years before, the development of LASIK is generally credited to Ioannis Pallikaris from Greece around 1991.” Greece adopted health care reform in 1983. (see: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10131279 , which won’t preview correctly, presumably because of a lack of an .htm suffix.)
* Cochlear implants were initially developed by a 3M team in the early 1970s.
The remaining 9 of the 11 items you list (or 82%) were all done by academic, government-funded researchers of various countries.
Given this, it’s time to turn your question around: “Please list all the Medical inventions that have come solely from private-sector research since WWII, regardless of country. I’m talking new developments.”
I’ve given you two of your list to start with. Are there any others?
Your assumptions are false,
Of about 93 Billion in medical research funding in the U.S. only 26 Billion was provided by the government. Just because the research was done in an academic environment does not mean that the funding did not come from for profit business. Many many researches take inventions from the Lab and form small companies to promote and profit from their research. many academic institutions make a significant portion of their research funds from their patent portfolio.
On top of that many many universities in the U.S. are private institutions with minimal government funding of any kind.
Lastly when you socialize health care you see a significant diversion from research funding from basic research toward immediate medical care costs. IE its hard for a politician to deal with a complaining constituent that is complaining about the 2 week wait to see a doctor and divert the funding to future research.
Other than the proffit vs socialized medicine funding difference how else would you explain the difference in results from U.S. institutions and the european research institiutions.
As for you LASIX claim, clearly some of the early radial keratonomy research was initially developed in Europe, but the modern LASIK was developed in the U.S, as a for profit endeavor out side of the traditional healt care setting. (As a result the costs for LASIK have plummeted vs more traditional health care treatments.)
2 Questions for European readers…
1)Last week I had a minor non urgent medical issue I wanted to see my doctor about, I called at 8:30am and had an appointment at 11:30 am How long is your doctor wait? (this was not some random Doctor from a big group, its “my” personal doctor.)
2)My 79 year old father was riding in a car when someone turned left in front of the car and they crashed in the intersection. Airbags deployed and he had significant bruising He was not injured other than that. He got up and walked away from the crash. He was taken to the emergency room because he was complaining that his sturnum area hurt. Within in 2 hours of the crash, he had had chest xrays looking for broken ribs, and an MRI looking for soft tissue damage . (The MRI actually found some unrelated fluid siting on top his diaphragm and they suggested he see his normal doctor about that.)
In European medical utopia how long would either of these visits
taken?
Or would it be like Liam Neeson’s wife who died because the Canadian Medical Utopia did not have a CAT scan available? No hospital in the vicinity of a major Ski resort in the U.S. would be without a on site CAT scan machine. The bastiaon of conservative thinking the New York post agrees…
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/item_GCJDJyjiBPnoXPOkTu1x8L;jsessionid=CACAA0066FA295E8394E45EB0617FDFA
“Of about 93 Billion in medical research funding in the U.S. only 26 Billion was provided by the government.”
That’s as may be. However, in your earlier posts you’ve implied some discoveries are more important than others. If we take your unsubstantiated claim of $26 billion provided by the government as correct, and it has produced 100% of our Nobel prize winners and 82% of the important innovations on your list, while the $67 billion of shareholder money you claim has provided 0% of the Nobel prize winners and 18% of the important innovations… Well, I’d call that an efficient use of taxpayer money.
“Just because the research was done in an academic environment does not mean that the funding did not come from for profit business.”
I agree entirely. I look forward to your providing citations of examples from the instances you’ve called our attention to.
“As for you LASIX claim, clearly some of the early radial keratonomy research was initially developed in Europe, but the modern LASIK was developed in the U.S, as a for profit endeavor out side of the traditional healt care setting.”
Perhaps I was unclear. I basically said that Dr. Srinivasan’s work at IBM was private, and chalked up LASIK as such. I also said Dr. Pallikaris contributed substantial work, but that’s non-controversial, as any googling of lasik pallikaris shows. Nothwithstanding that, I’m ascribing LASIK as one of the two privately-researched innovations on your list.
Your position basically boils down to, “Keep your government hands off my government-funded research!”
As for Mr. Murdoch’s Post, it is a bastion of conservative thinking. Alas. More’s the pity for those of us who are conservatives and don’t appreciate our thinking caricatured, but there you go.
“No hospital in the vicinity of a major Ski resort in the U.S. would be without a on site CAT scan machine.”
This is factually inaccurate, as I know from personal experience at Big Bear Lake, CA. (I’ll see your anecdote and raise.) Given that both examples are anecdotal, do you have any actual data?
I should be more clear, no Major Ski resort (I’d hardly call big bear major) won’t have a nearby hospital with CAT scan capability. Try riverside, or San Bernadino. Less than 1hr from Big bear. The Actual Village of Big bear has none, but the whole LA basin is well served by helicopter air evacuation.
So for general research funding in the U.S. 72% comes from non governmental sources. For basic research most of that is funneled through academic channels first. So I’d count at least 72% of the Nobel prizes won in the U.S. as being partially or mostly privately funded.
2009 Nobel split three ways UC San Francisco, Johns hopkins and Harvard, 2 of the 3 are private not government funded facilities.
(and the one non private is state, not federaly funded)
2008 All European
2007 1/3 Private (howard hughes research institute) 2/3 public.
2006 1/2 private 1/2 public
2005 Both Australian research done before Aus went to social medicine.
2004 100% private institutions.
2003 Both public.
2002 2/3 private 1/3 trust not government funded.
2001 1/3 private 2/3 can’t tell probably public.
2000 2/3 private 1/3 can’t tell probably public
1999 100% private.
One of the interesting cases is the 2003 case, where you might count both as government funded, yet Mansfields work caused him to file patents that made him a very wealthy man, so did he do research for a profit? sure looks like it to me? If his research was really state funded how could he file a patent on it?
Please note that the U.K really has two duplicate medical systems the over crowded barely functional public one and a separate private system for those with the ability to pay.
(Oh, great. I document in detail, and I’m told I’m posting spam by the site’s comment software.)
Paul, I know I’m sounding like a broken record here, but again: Who are your sources?
From the National Science Foundation page already cited by me:
“Higher education R&D relies heavily on federal support, along with a variety of other funding sources. The federal government has consistently contributed the majority of the funds (figure 5-2)”
Does “Industry” contribute to university R&D? Sure… about 5% of the time. So 19 times out of 20, if a research project is going on at US university, the funding is from some governmental agency.
Science Daily, quoting a study in the Journal of the AMA by Dorsey, et al., reports:
“… industry remained the largest contributor to biomedical research, accounting for 58 percent of all expenditures in 2007, and the NIH remained the second-largest contributor, accounting for 27 percent of expenditures.”
However, the claim that industry is the primary source of funding for university research is not made. The strong implication is that industry is financing R&D among themselves, and choosing to be paid what the market can manage in lieu of receiving recognition for such research.
Which brings us back to your list:
2009 Nobel split three ways UC San Francisco, Johns hopkins and Harvard, 2 of the 3 are private not government funded facilities.
I guess Harvard’s main research page, and Johns Hopkins’ main research funding page, both prominently featuring Federal grant application processes, are just for show, yes?
2008 All European
So funded by their governments.
2007 1/3 Private (howard hughes research institute) 2/3 public.
From the document, “WHAT IT MEANS TO BE AN HHMI INVESTIGATOR” (HHMI being Howard Hughes Medical Institute), “Grants. Most HHMI investigators are also PIs on one or more NIH or other federal or non-federal grants. Because HHMI does not employ graduate students at host institutions, investigators typically pay graduate student stipends from federal grants. HHMI does not have the ability to “backstop” or replace funding from federal grants that are not renewed.”
2006 1/2 private 1/2 public
That would be Stanford, and U Mass Worcester.
From a page at Stanford regarding how to fund research:
2005 Both Australian research done before Aus went to social medicine.
The prize was given for work done in 1982.
Barry J. Marshall
1977-84 Registrar, Medicine, Royal Perth Hospital
J. Robin Warren
1968-99 Pathologist, Royal Perth Hospital
According to the history page of the Royal Perth Hospital, it has always been a public institution. (Having been called the “Perth Public Hospital” for a number of years was probably a giveaway.)
I might go on if there was even one instance of this going your way. I’ll tell you the truth, when I started this thread, I thought it would be 50-50. But the more I look into the topic, two things become obvious: 1) Almost all the relevant research is government-funded, regardless of country, and can be documented as such; 2) Your assertions are based on hearsay at best, and blind utopian ideology at worst.
Again, do you have any empirical evidence at all for your claims? Any evidence at all of a privately-funded Nobel winner? Please be specific, with documentation.
Checking out the links, here’s Funding Information Resources at Stanford’s School of Medicine.
Any evidence at all of a privately-funded Nobel winner?
Penzio, Bell Labs.
Rand:
Ah. Syntax error on my part. I meant, “…a privately-funded Nobel winner in Medicine?” Since that was the topic we were discussing, and all. I’ve also already acknowledged Bell Labs upthread, and noted there doesn’t appear to be something similar in life sciences.
(And you probably mean Arno Penzias. But Bell Labs has had many winners for Physics, including two this year.)
But that’s Physics. In Medicine, the number of privately-funded Nobel winners is, um… scarce.
As always, everything is provisional, pending better data. I do insist on that better data, though.