John Green vs. Johnson & Johnson (part 2)

An Arm and a Leg

Society & Culture, Medicine, Health, Health & Fitness, Documentary

4.8 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 28 September 2023

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This is part two of our globe-spanning story about drugs, patents, and YouTube megastar John Green.

Quick recap: In our last episode, we learned how writer and YouTube star John Green kicked up a fight with Johnson & Johnson over a medicine called bedaquiline. And appeared to score a victory.

Here, we dig into the backstory: How everything John Green and his fans won was built on activism going back 20 years, and spanning multiple continents.

All of it illustrates how pharma companies work the patent system to extend their legal monopolies on medicine way beyond the standard 20 years, and how that leads to high drug prices here and abroad.

And what we can maybe do about it.

This episode starts in 2004, when India began the process of changing its patent laws to align with global trade rules. Activists there managed to carve out exceptions to the law to prevent some of the worst patent abuses.

Fast forward to this year, when those legal safeguards become key to unlocking new doors in the fight against TB.

Meanwhile, the proponents of those Indian safeguards are here in the U.S., pushing for drug patent reform here. Which not only could help Americans, but also influence global standards.

Here's a transcript of this episode.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey there, this is part two of a two-part story, and although I think it is great on its own,
0:05.1	I also think you're going to enjoy it a lot more if you listen to the first part.
0:09.8	I'm just saying, okay, here's what we left off last time.
0:13.6	The writer John Green, author of the mega-seller, the vault in our stars, and unbeknownst
0:18.8	to a whole lot of people, an absolute legend on YouTube, which will become a big part
0:23.2	of the story before we're done, was feeling something like despair about drug prices, especially
0:30.6	the price of a particular drug, one that is needed to treat tuberculosis in other countries,
0:35.0	a drug that's literally life and death for millions of people made by and priced out of
0:41.0	reach by Johnson and Johnson.
0:44.3	John Green knew eight out of nine people who need this drug.
0:48.0	Don't get it.
0:49.0	This is all I was thinking about.
0:50.9	How did we end up in a world where the world's deadliest infectious diseases largely ignored
0:55.8	in the richest parts of the world?
0:58.4	But I felt powerless before it.
1:00.2	Because the drug was under patent protection.
1:02.2	So Johnson and Johnson had a legal monopoly and they could set the price.
1:07.4	Even so, John Green knew there were people trying to find a way.
1:11.2	And I would look at these activists and I would say, this is amazing what they're doing.
1:14.8	This is incredible.
1:15.8	I don't understand how they have the energy to fight these fights where the chance of
1:20.5	winning is so, so, so slim.
	...

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