PEDIATRICS Vol. 86 No. 3 September 1990, pp. A61
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow P3Rs: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when P3Rs are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow E-mail this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My File Cabinet
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via CrossRef
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by L., J. F.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow Articles by L., J. F.

$125 MILLION QUESTION: WHAT DO DRUGS COST?

J. F. L. MD

How much do new drugs cost to develop?

Ask officials at U.S. pharmaceutical companies how much they spent taking a drug from test tube to market and they invariably will say "about $125 million." The figure's accuracy, however, is hotly disputed by regulators and industry critics.

Indeed, the amount isn't derived from direct accounting of the spending on a specific drug. Instead, it is based on an academic study, sponsored by drug makers in the late 1970s, which added up total R&D costs and divided it by the number of drugs produced. Back then, the study said the bill for a new drug was $80 million. It was updated to $125 million a few years ago by adding in inflation...

...A Food and Drug Administration official contends that half the 30 drugs for use in life-threatening illnesses approved in the 1980s were first discovered abroad, and that much of the testing was done by foreign companies. Moreover...much of the research for the drugs first came out of university labs partly sponsored by federal grants.