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Simon said :- <snip> are turned out at a few cent each by Indian manufacturers, the real cost of developing a new medicine is probably only a small fraction of the figure they quote, but I dare say it is a lot more expensive to develop. </snip> Hence why the WTO organisation (under pressure from the good old US of A drug giants) told india to change its patent laws regarding medicines (in india you can patent a production technique and not the drug itself at the moment). This leads to competition in drugs manufacture in India and thus drove costs down. Now India must conform to patent law (according to USA's interpretation) or have a trade embargo whacked on them. As a consequence drugs in this country (and a lot of other countries ) will go up in cost (because we buy extensively from India). Does the pattern seem similar ? >most software doesn't have the same sort of consequences when it fails. Hmm... tell that to a space shuttle commander ? Ok you did say most, and I guess the lives of seven crew members would never stack up against the number of thalidomide victims, although any human loss is a tragedy in my book. But the point is all software failure has an impact on the user to a lesser or greater degree. And while it may not be life threatening to you it may seem that way to others. Of course it never, ever happens that developed world drug manufactures use third world consumers as "beta testers" for their new drugs does it ? Or is this a legitimate way of saying we keep our development costs down. Besides if it where so risky why do shareholders have shares in drug companies ? Sure there is a risk, but then you can always pump up the license fees in lean times (bit like SCO ?). If it is so risky and expensive would it not be better to put drug production into global public ownership ? Drugs by the people for the people ? No I guess some would see this as another way of wasting tax payers money, which brings us full circle again. Or maybe split the research into public ownership and the manufacture into private sector ? Technical question: can you patent the process of thinking ? If so I would never be in danger of having to pay a licence fee ! Tom. Information in this message is confidential and may be legally privileged. It is the intended solely for the person ( or persons) to whom it is addressed. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender, and please delete the message from your system immediately. The views in this message are personal, they are not necessarily those of Torbay Council. -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG Mail majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe list" in the message body to unsubscribe.