Mr. Speaker, would the member for St. John's West agree that the goal, for all the moral and ethical reasons one could cite, must be to get drugs into the hands of the people who need them most at the most affordable cost? Would he not agree that our single and most primary objective as legislators is to put in place a legislative slate that would enable drugs to get into the hands of people who need them at the cheapest possible cost?
That raises the question. We have heard the argument in speeches today and on other occasions that even prior to the existing intellectual property patent protection the drug companies were making good, vast, healthy profits. What we are seeing now is their relentless effort to increase profits more and more.
We heard earlier that not all their costs go into research. Over half their costs go into advertising, glossy promotions, TV ads, et cetera, trying to promote their products. We cannot argue that the costs of all drug companies are in research and development.
What does the hon. member think is a reasonable patent protection period of time? Would 10 years be adequate? Have we ever studied this issue in an objective manner? Where is the market research to say or where is the empirical evidence to prove that drug companies need 20 years and now 25 years?
Would he change his mind if we could illustrate to him that if we gave a five to seven year patent protection drug companies could make a good profit? Would he not agree that generic drug companies should be able to take over and get more drugs into the hands of people who need them?