A hedge fund trader is at the centre of mounting controversy after the pharmaceutical company he bought raised overnight the cost of a life-saving treatment for people with Aids and weakened immune systems from $13.50 per pill to $750.
The 5,000 per cent increase was enacted last month for Daraprim, known generically as pyrimethamine, by Turing Pharmaceuticals of New York, a start-up firm, shortly after it bought the rights to the drug. The firm is headed by Martin Shkreli.
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Earlier this the month, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) and the HIV Medicine Association sent a joint letter to Turing calling the price increase for Daraprim “unjustifiable for the medically vulnerable patient population”.
“Please help us improve public health by immediately implementing a rational and fair pricing strategy for pyrimethamine that keeps treatment for a potentially fatal condition accessible to our patients,” the letter said.
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On Monday, Mr Shkreli told Bloomberg News that firms that had previously owned the rights to the drug had been "virtually giving it away". He added: "It is still under-priced compared to its peers."
This is absolutely disgusting and a perfect example of the dangers of capitalism
this just means that the government here has to pay for the drugs, which a lot of the time they don't deem viable. it's just as big a problem with universal health care systems.
How odd.