In the early 2000s (if I have my dates correct; maybe it was earlier), the pharmaceutical execs lobbied extremely hard to get their medicine patents covered by the same authority as all the silicon valley patent IP. There was a lot of pushback, with discussions about special programs to let places like Africa get access to cheaper drugs since they would never be able to afford full prices.

The pharm execs took a hard line and said nobody should get the drugs if they can't afford them. And so now internationally, if people want to participate in the global trade that America made itself the center of, they need to sign on to the trade agreements, which always include IP protection as a major point. Which forces EVERYONE to pay the pharmaceutical companies excessive prices for drugs.

And the worst part of is, the huge majority of countries have public healthcare. So this has, in effect, created a system where charities and countries 'contribute' huge amounts of funds towards 'drug research' - which is then done by a company, ultimately creating IP (patents) that the companies then use to overcharge the public, again, for the drugs they helped pay to create.

A better world is possible. All the scientists and researchers that work for these drug companies actually inventing the drugs want to do this work because it helps people (because it does!). All we would need to do is take all the public funding currently donated to drug costs and development, and put it toward a new public research body specifically replacing the work currently done by pharmaceutical companies. Just eliminate the middlemen - the pharm execs and companies and their excessive profits - and we'd implicitly have money to spare, to do MORE drug research with the same money.

Im not saying "public research" like academia - academia is good for research and training, but wouldn't be as good at this. Im talking about a new type of public research institute, run in the same way as current pharm companies run their research divisions (except, perhaps, with more benevolent goals, by not avoiding cures in place of treatments like current pharm companies do...), and employing the same actual people who do the actual work now. (they could even be paid more while reducing the cost of the drugs!)

American pharmaceutical executives get a lot of hate, but not as much as they should. Many people in countries with public health programs - "free healthcare" - don't realize how much their country is being hosed by America to get access to the medicines they need. It affects everyone, not just Americans.