We could eradicate HIV/AIDS in America. What's standing in the way?

[Uncle Joe]

Link to tweet

(snip)

A total of 40 personal injury lawsuits have been brought by roughly 1,500 patients accusing Gilead of delaying release of an improved antiviral medication for more than a decade so that the Foster City, Calif.-based company could profit from its first drug until the patent expired.

(snip)

Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez contend that a generic version of Descovy could “quickly and affordably reach hundreds of thousands of Americans.”

A patent extension for Gilead would delay the generic version’s market entry in the U.S.

To do so would set a “very dangerous precedent for other wealthy and powerful corporations that will look to be rewarded for deception and misconduct,” the members of Congress wrote.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/pharma-and-life-sciences/gilead-in-spotlight-after-two-democrats-target-hiv-drug-patent

[George II]

1. Here we go................

[sheshe2]

3. IKR?

[PhoenixDem]

5. A new boogieman every day

It is always someone else's fault

[NurseJackie]

14. It's predictable and laughable.

Another pie in the sky "only I can save you" empty promise.

Everyone knows that only Bill Nye can save the world!

[enid602]

2. Gilead

Gilead. An unfortunate choice of names.

[RockRaven]

4. Not unfortunate at all. Prophetic. Honest. Prescient. Purposeful.

Hosea 6:8

To borrow a phrase from football coach Dennis Green, "They are who we thought they were!!!"

[NurseJackie]

6. ...

[OldRed2450]

7. IIRC Bernie dissed AIDS activist badly in 2016.

Forgive me if I'm skeptical but does he care about AIDS/HIV or is this another way to lash out against his favorite monsters?

[LongtimeAZDem]

8. "Bernie Sanders Manipulates a False Message From His Meeting with HIV/AIDS Activists Today"

The latest eruption occurred after Sanders left the meeting and issued a press release claiming the activists joined him in supporting a controversial California drug initiative that the activists strongly oppose, and they’d indicated as much to Sanders.

In an article today in THE AMERICAN BLOG discussing the CA Drug Initiative Staley said Sanders hadn’t even brought up the initiative at the meeting with the activists — it was they who raised the issue with him. Yet Sanders is now claiming that the meeting was set to discuss the initiative, and that the activists agreed with him, when they most certainly do not.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/5/26/1531538/-Bernie-Sanders-Manipulates-a-False-Message-From-His-Meeting-with-HIV-AIDS-Activists-Today

[The Valley Below]

9. Imagine living in America when we are hit with another epidemic like AIDS,

but instead of having a world class pharmaceutical industry that can spring into action, its been mau-maued into submission.

Some people seem to think the next break-though treatments will invent themselves.

[PETRUS]

15. While we're using our imaginations...

Imagine how much more quickly medical science would advance if we legislated the pharmaceutical industry into submission and increased public funding for research. As it stands, corporations have strong incentives to both hide and misrepresent the results of their research, and to pour funding into creating copycat drugs rather than developing new treatments.

[Stonepounder]

10. I'm beginning to think that the only way for the human race

(and most other living creatures) to not go extinct is for our entire civilization to crumble and something like 99% of humans to die off and our society go back to something approaching the stone age. Let Mother Earth recover, let science start over, go back to subsistence farming, and try again.

We are destroying the earth and trying to kill off the lower and middle classes in the name of profit. We are destroying government and replacing it with an Oligarchy that cares only for more and more money - more than an Oligarch could possibly spend in multiple lifetimes. And we are working on killing off just about all life on earth.

Am I feeling cynical tonight? Nahhhh. I'm watching our almost 250 year old experiment in Democracy not only crumble due to the Oligarch Party which calls itself Grand and Old which is working hand in glove to destroy our system of checks and balances and getting away with it. I'm watching 40% of the population thinking that Trump is wonderful because he's a racist, a bully, and an anti-Semite and who will probably win re-election due to the welcome mat the Senate is rolling out to the other Dictators of the world to diddle our election, so even though the Dems get millions more votes the gerrymandering and the Electoral College will give the election to the Oligarch Party.

I'm glad I'm old and not in the best of health. I do mourn for my kids and my grandkids, and even my great-grandkid. I hate to think of the world I am leaving them.

[FreeState]

11. FYI - PrEP goes generic in the US next fall

I’ve been on it for 5 years. I’ve paid $0. It’s very easy to get and paid for. Much of this is due to Obama.

[NurseJackie]

13. I know it's not a "cure"... but I wonder... if enough at-risk individuals used it...

I know it's not a "cure"... but I wonder... if enough at-risk individuals used it... would the disease (theoretically) "die out" over time?

[mitch96]

12. Cynical me..... the pharmaceutical industrial complex hasn't made enough money off the disease.. nt