Comment by mchusma

If we allowed any type of experimentation on dying patients as long as there was consent, dying patients would end up getting used as a Guineapigs by companies trying to get a lucky indication. It would certainly benefit the families left behind financially, but it would not be pretty. “Here’s a million bucks, please take these 40 drugs that will certainly kill you, but we’ll learn which one we should continue with”. And why even do toxicity studies or phase 1 and 2 trials? It’s cheaper to pay of poor people who are on the verge of dying and just pushing them over the edge.

The decision should be just because a patient and a doctor, because the consequences of such decisions are more far reaching than just those two. We have a well established framework for what a drug needs to prove before they can reasonable be allowed to be given to any human being, no matter their situation, and that barrier of entry is there for a multitude of good reasons. Discarding it just because a specific patient is at risk of dying or because you can get consent is not helping patients.

Such patients have opportunities to access experimental drugs, either in clinical trials, or through compassionate use waivers.

https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/treatment/drugs/access-e...

There's definitely a case to be made for early access to drugs for certain terminal illnesses in cases where there is compelling evidence that the drugs will pass Phase 3 trials. But, that should hardly be the 'default' as OP suggests.

Because it would degenerate into pharmaceuticals selling false hope in exchange for lab rats that are too far along to be saved even if the drugs work.

That being said I disagree with prescription pads. I should buy antibiotics for my kid without waiting four, five hours to be seen and processed

> Because (at least) for people with a high risk of dying

and who decides that?

Can a drug company give "gifts" to doctor who then recommend the patient use that company's drugs when he/she is dying?

I just gave you a document containing 8 case studies where drugs were found to be not safe after having passed Phase 2 trials.

The alternative is worse, unfortunately. See the recent Aduhelm debacle for example, with big pharma profiting from desperate people, with a drug that doesn't work.

Pharma would market a phase 2 trial drug as a “potential revolution in treatment. Only a select few can receive this treatment and as a result it costs 10x more than existing drugs. Ps. We don’t guarantee results.”

Is that really the outcome you want?

Except vioxx. One of the biggest mistaken approvals of all time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rofecoxib#Withdrawal