Cost of developing new drugs may be far lower than industry claims, trial reveals

Exclusive: MSF calls for transparency after its bill for a trial of TB treatment came to a fraction of the billions claimed by pharmaceutical companies

Doctors have for the first time released details of their spending on a major clinical trial, demonstrating that the true cost of developing a medicine may be far less than the billions of dollars claimed by the pharmaceutical industry.

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is challenging drug companies to be transparent about the cost of trials, which has always been shrouded in secrecy. Its own bill for landmark trials of a four-drug combination treatment for drug-resistant tuberculosis came to €34m (£29m).

Current estimates for research and development of new medicines range from €40m to €3.9bn. The extortionate cost of trials is used to justify high prices of new medicines, but companies do not publish either the topline or a breakdown of their spending. MSF says this opacity should end. It has produced a toolkit for drug trialists, which categorises each item of expenditure and allows the costs to be collated throughout the process, which can last for years.

MSF’s trial, called TB Practecal, has transformed prospects for people with drug-resistant forms of TB, which have high mortality rates and in some countries have been untreatable because of the high price of the few drugs that still work.

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