For every dollar invested in research and development, there is a return of about 14.5 dollars. Companies often use the substantial cost of research to justify the high price of cancer drugs (1). In 2017, a study of 10 cancer drugs showed that sales of these drugs brought in seven times more income in four years than the cost of investment in research and development (R&D) (2). A new study, this time on 99 cancer drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration between 1989 and 2017, reports even greater profitability: 1 US dollar invested in R&D generated a median sales income of 14.5 US dollars by the end of 2017 (ranging from 3.3 to around 55 dollars) (1). The estimates of R&D costs in the study took into account the risk of clinical trial failure, and turned out to be comparable with pharmaceutical industry estimates. The data on income generated by the sales of the drugs was in most cases extracted from their financial reports (1). Based on these and other results, the World Health Organization, of which the three authors of the study are members, is calling for strengthening the policies regulating cancer drug prices (1,3). A large number of new cancer drugs are sold at exorbitant prices, while most often providing only modest therapeutic benefit (2).
展开▼
