No, I think you're absolutely right. That is a major problem.
If you're a clinician, you may be able to finance this yourself, but a lot of the discoveries are made by basic scientists who do not have access to that kind of money.
I should have said a little more about what I did in this business. I developed the first antiviral for hepatitis B. There are 400 million people worldwide who carry hepatitis B, and hepatitis B is the commonest cause of fatal cancer in the world. We developed the first antiviral here in Canada. It is now marketed in over 200 countries, and cumulative sales are around $6 billion.
When the first patent was filed, the University of Alberta paid the patent cost for the first year. After that, we found money from family and friends to somehow patent it. That can't always go on like that.
When we partnered, I tried to set up some venture capital. There was Vencap in Alberta. They would have funded me to build a gravel pit or a restaurant, but biotech? No way.