Francis Collins: We need better drugs -- now

Today we know the molecular cause of 4,000 diseases, but treatments are available for only 250 of them. So what's taking so long? Geneticist and physician Francis Collins explains why systematic drug discovery is imperative, even for rare and complex diseases, and offers a few solutions -- like teaching old drugs new tricks.

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes (or less). Look for talks on Technology, Entertainment and Design -- plus science, business, global issues, the arts and much more.

[TheRantsofReason]

What are the other supposed health benefits for cannabis other than effectively treating cancer to a certain extent? I'd be interested to hear what other benefits you have in mind, also what constitutes as high quality cannabis and do you have any further peer reviewed reading that i could browse over? Or even better documentaries (as i tend to prefer visual/audio forms of information)

[SuperDrRockzo]

Yeah, he was well spoken as well. Straight A+ is also impressive, especially for a school in Boston.

[SIMKINETICS]

Damn! In '92, I co-invented a DNA sequencer & contributed to the design of another, both of which were commercially successful for researchers. To date, I regard these activities as the most important in my life because they've been part of a growing movement to improve all our lives in fundamental ways. My message to young people wondering about their future careers: go for science & engineering... it's very, very satisfying!

[BIZEB]

I think that, for the purpose of this talk, it was necessary. They are limited on time, and the crowd didn't miss out on relevant information, at least not to the awareness he wanted to raise. He made his point clear enough with just that example of drugs. And for those diseases that can't be treated with drugs, well they don't benefit from his proposition. He didn't just reference it, it was (almost) the whole purpose of the talk.

[Gewath]

I blame the mass media for idolizing individuals to where any conversation is about the individual and not what the individual actually said.
Also, I think YouTube itself should have functions implemented to stop irrelevant conversations about things like religion, the mass media and YouTube comment fields themselves just dominating comment fields. Maybe keyword recognition? We have the power. Where's the government in all this?...

[BabyBop]

Holy shit why is every video muddled with comments about religion? This video is about drugs. Please - anyone - start arguing about marijuana or something. At least that would make more sense...

[JakeTurnerhyperion]

Yeah no personal Gods but he was a pantheist. which is not a Atheist. Pantheism does not mean Atheist, as "Atheist" denies the existence of God. Einstein never denied the existence of God, but rather denied the existence of a God that is overly concerned with the inhabitants of a little blue-green planet, and he definitely denied the existence of a God that demands certain food restrictions or worship practices.

[limoguy]

Not once in his presentation did he even bring up religion, and yet there are so many hateful and pretentiously negative comments here about the topic.

Disappointing to see, that's all.

[MarsyasX]

That makes so sense. The only incentive for private companies to risk billions of their dollars researching new drugs is knowing once they have a drug that works, others can't steal their formula for the duration of the patent. You remove the patent system, and no private corporation has an incentive to spend its own money doing research.

[americanu]

i think he made some pretty good points about companies being narrow minded and far to commercially oriented to see stuff that might be useful and about how primitive our testing options still are

[MewCat]

Quite true. I assume he is talking about farnesyltransferase inhibitors, of which there are several. The thing is, it really doesn't cure progeria, but it does prolong life and improve quality. Cure is really not the right word to use.

[mintoocool]

a part of me was like ... wtf this old kid has a really small head and he talks like a kid but looks 80 and laughing when he was talking. the other half was happy for him and was glad that he was getting to lead a normal life

[MewCat]

If you replace the word atheist with Christian, Muslim, average person, this post would be no less true. It's the internet, where people say nasty things regardless of their opinion on god.

[TheGeekySkeptic]

First, where does Mr. Collins say that receptor targeting is the only way for drugs to work?
Second, where does Mr. Collins say that all problems can be solved with Drugs?
Third, of Collins already made reference to the fact you describe, then what's your point?

[gallownumber]

I cant fathom why there are 42 dislikes to this video.

[NDPdEport]

i wasn't referring to their family background for instance Tesla was born Serbian Orthodox. but he was a transcendentalist who was actively very spiritual

[Jayremy]

Some people, a profit motive is all that matters; for more good people, which is a majority in this world I would hope, a cure for cancer doesn't need a big price tag for them to be willing.

If you don't believe in charity, we have nothing more to speak about. Most humans want to do good for others, be remembered as such and make a difference.

In the utilitarian sense (the reason for patents/copyrights), it only demotivates MORE people from getting into it and contributing or making progress.

[MewCat]

You wouldn't be the only one. Basically, he is saying that drug development is too slow and then he blames the drug companies and the FDA. This has been an ongoing argument in science for decades now. The fact of the matter is:
1. Drug development is incredibly difficult because the human body is incredible complex. Orders of magnitude more complex than any machine ever built. More complex than space travel.
2. The human genome project has not yielded the panacea of information expected CONT

[TheZombieboyRoy]

Do we need better drugs and better means to develop and design them? YES. What we need more then that right now is a larger acceptance and understanding of just what a drug is, here in the US drugs are either poison or prescription and fail to see how one can be entirely like the other. Less harmful drug laws along with the ability to even test these drugs and use them. Some psychoactive drugs have been found to cure hard drug addicts in a 50% rate, yet get shut down due to using illegal drugs.

[plasmax]

Didn't think I'd like this one as much as I do! Having a personal biochip doctors can use to test medicinal drugs on you before prescribing them.... Incredible idea!! The number of falsely prescribed drugs leading to worsening conditions is colossal.