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The reluctance of pharmaceutical companies to develop new antibiotics for economic reasons could set us back decades when it comes to life expectancy

This is what Nobel laureate Prof. Ada Yonat said in the keynote speech at the Life Science Baltics conference taking place in Lithuania. In her estimation, the retreat will be tangible within 20-30 years

Prof. Ada Yonat at the opening plenary of the Life Sciences Baltics conference held in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania on September 12, 2012. Photo by Avi Blizovsky
Prof. Ada Yonat at the opening plenary of the Life Sciences Baltics conference held in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania on September 12, 2012. Photo by Avi Blizovsky


Pharmaceutical companies do not like to invest in research and development of new antibiotics. This is what Nobel laureate Prof. Ada Yonath said yesterday (Wed), who was the keynote speaker at the Life Science Baltics conference currently taking place in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania.

According to her, the pharmaceutical companies excuse the minority of action by saying that the war is against
The bacteria's adaptation to antibiotics is lost anyway. But there are also reasons for this: people take antibiotics for two or three weeks, while there are other medicines for diabetes, blood pressure, cholesterol that after the age of 50 every person takes for life. That's a lot more money. Medicines for Alzheimer's and cancer also provide a lot of income for the pharmaceutical companies."

Prof. Yonat called on the people of the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry, as well as scientists from all over the world gathered at the conference, not to give up on this war even if the medicine they invent will not necessarily bring a lot of money.

"If companies don't think and act quickly, we will quickly return to the period before Atibitics within 20-30 years"
Prof. Yonat opened her lecture by stating that the curve of the increase in life expectancy was halted in the 10s after it had grown 15-90 years to levels that, if they had continued, in many countries we would have reached a life expectancy of XNUMX years or more for women.

The blame for the containment is the resistance developed by the bacteria to antibiotics within 15 years of the development of the first antibiotics. "We all want to be like Rita Levy Montaccanti, the winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology who is still functioning well at the age of 103. Later, she described the process of discovering the structure of the ribosome, in particular the ribosome of bacteria, which was important to know in order to understand how antibiotic drugs that focus on the ribosome work.

The knowledge site will continue and report on various events within the conference in which about 700 representatives from the three Baltic countries - Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia - as well as a large delegation of 120 people from Israel, including 70 representatives of companies and businessmen, are participating.
Among other things, I held an interview with today's opening lecturer, Prof. Michel Rebel

11 תגובות

  1. Alon - words for girls!
    I agree with the spirit of your words and that is what I meant in my previous response
    good week
    Sabdarmish Yehuda

  2. There is a tendency to sanctify the idea of ​​a "free market" in certain issues, and not in others.
    For example, it is clear that security issues (raised by Chen) are heavily regulated issues,
    The intention of the government, and heavy financing by the tax payer - instead of by market forces.

    Unbridled capitalism, and the lack of regulation that comes with it - have already degraded the field of medicine into Kafkaesque regions.

    1) A strong lobby of the pharmaceutical companies makes sure to leave the profit horizons open: there are no restrictions on narcotics, low taxation, and in general they make sure that regulation stays away from them.

    2) Inventions of debunked chronic conditions and labeling unclear amorphous conditions. The population that has learned to solve problems with consumer products such as drugs create a dependency on the drug that is supposed to solve the situation. In practice, they become prisoners of the pharmaceutical companies.

    3) Blatant bribery of doctors! The sales representatives of the pharmaceutical companies (who are known to be very beautiful women) are professional seducers, who take care of subsidizing the accommodation and meals of a vacation pretending to be a conference. In practice, the doctors receive perks, and at these "conferences" they are brainwashed! They are sold many times later they are also the conduit through which the hospital orders the drugs/equipment - and thus of course a clear circle of supervision is created: the doctor knows that next time they won't order him if he doesn't cooperate... and the Kafkaesque part here - that everyone knows it!

    4) Studies are biased by targeted funding.

    This field has already passed the threshold of promiscuity in the USA, and it is on the threshold here in Israel.

    This whole area needs to be reformed - similar to Japan - and become directly subordinate to the government. The doctors need to receive their salary from the state. And the same goes for the hospital's budget. Research directions are coordinated and directed by a dedicated office. It's a shame for all the double R&D that is wasted in the wars between the pharmaceutical companies.

    Those who are familiar with how the issue of security is managed in Israel know how it is possible to act in coordination - while maintaining a certain level of competitiveness.

    Medicine must not be left to be steered by the coordinated forces of economists...

  3. I assume that not necessarily the only cause of reluctance in the development of new drugs is the loss of future profit.
    There is no doubt that one of the problems is that the R&D in medicine costs a lot of money, a process that takes a long time including all kinds of approvals.
    I agree that there is a problem described in the article, but this problem is only a single element out of several components.

  4. Even if all the money ever invested for military purposes, was invested in medicine, engineering, etc.. imagine where we would be now.
    There is nothing to do. Man is an absurd and retarded creature.. (there are exceptions).

  5. I don't understand why there is no financial benefit for them to develop antibiotics.

    If people die young, then they won't be able to later sell them profitable drugs (diabetes, cancer, etc.) until a late age.

    There is something illogical in this whole story.

  6. Sabdarmish Yehuda
    The way to fight this phenomenon is to break monopolies - and to do that, among other things, you need to allow a lower entry threshold by reducing regulation.
    Pharmaceutical companies compete with each other, so if one finds a cure for AIDS it will have no problem sending its competitors to hell (and getting its researchers a Nobel Prize with the prestige it provides).

    Governments (more precisely governments of welfare states) have no real interest in increasing life expectancy because it makes the population old - luckily welfare governments usually don't think that far, otherwise life expectancy would be at retirement age.

  7. Please note that the pharmaceutical companies have no interest in developing drugs for diabetes, AIDS, blood pressure, etc., because it will screw up their income, unfortunately the state and its institutions also have no interest in increasing the quality of life because of the cost of pension and national insurance payments.
    And in addition
    The interest of the pharmaceutical companies to set a lower threshold for the risk levels of sugar, blood pressure, etc
    For example, once a sugar level of 140 was not terrible, now the determination is 100, and this is how whole populations are introduced into the recipients of the pills every other day. The question is whether there is supervision of the arbitrary determinations and who should determine them
    Just food for thought
    Good night
    Sabdarmish Yehuda

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