Several years ago I read an article in Fortune about cancer research. Government funding is extremely conservative. They're happy to pay you to nail down another tiny detail about some kind of cancer, but try an innovative cure and they balk. They also take three years to get the money to you, by which time your research might be obsolete.
When Michael Milken got out of prison, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, and started a foundation to fight it. He asked researchers for the crazy ideas they really wanted to work on, and got the money to them in three months. In return, he insisted researchers immediately share what they learned. No patents, no waiting for prestigious publication.
According to Fortune, people in the field generally credit Milken's foundation with cutting prostate cancer death rates in half.
"Criminal" is a good qualifier for the way most medical research decision are done. I was once told, out of the blue, by a commercial in the field, that research for a HIV cure was a very low priority given how profitable the tritherapy was.
I've probably got him to thank for still having a stepfather - he was just treated for prostate cancer and it seems to be working. (In his case, they put tiny radioactive beads into the tumor to kill it over six months, which is really pretty damned awesome.)
When Michael Milken got out of prison, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, and started a foundation to fight it. He asked researchers for the crazy ideas they really wanted to work on, and got the money to them in three months. In return, he insisted researchers immediately share what they learned. No patents, no waiting for prestigious publication.
According to Fortune, people in the field generally credit Milken's foundation with cutting prostate cancer death rates in half.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2004/...