Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

Pharmaceuticals is about the worst example you could pick to make a point. It's notorious for socializing the cost and privatizing the profit (not to mention the ethics of price gouging life saving medication treatments).

Here's what Johnson&Johnson is doing right now with a TB drug whose development was paid largely with public funding:

The pill, called bedaquiline, was first approved in 2012 as the first new TB drug in over 40 years and revolutionized treatment for drug-resistant infections. But its relatively high cost limited access in many low- and middle-income countries hit hardest by an epidemic that still kills around 1.5 million people every year, most of them among the world’s poorest. The company initially charged $900 per course in low-income countries, according to a 2016 report, but gradually lowered it to $340 three years ago.

The secondary patent particularly irked some advocates because the drug’s development was largely underwritten by public funds, according to a 2020 analysis. That study found public sector funds contributed $455 million to $747 million to getting bedaquiline to market, compared to $90 million to $240 million from J&J.