Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

Remember, it takes 8-12 years and $1,000,000,000 on average to whittle 10,000 drug candidates into 1 fully tested FDA approved drug.

If a company is going to spend a decade and a billion attempting to develop a "management" antibiotic for continual profit, I'm willing to bet the profit motive exists for another company to make a normal antibiotic... that most doctors would happily prescribe over the ridiculous multi-year option...

It's a big risk and I doubt some company will attempt to make a maintenance drug out of antibiotics.

Unless you're implying that profit motive means they simply won't try because it's not insulin or something, which is ridiculous. Profit motive... there is profit to be made in a new antibiotic, there's the motive. Not every pharma company will just let money sit on the table in favor of older drugs nearing the end of patent protection.




Though one recent study of drug development costs had an antibiotic against C. difficile as one of the cheapest to develop.

I've actual found there's a fair amount of interest in antibiotic development among drug companies.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: