Utility in the 21st century

Utility is one of those things we can’t measure, but we know it when we see it. The 20th century was about becoming “developed” (In North America, Europe, Australia and parts of East Asia). What will the 21st century be about? After all, going from one to two refrigerators is a much smaller jump than going from zero to one.

One possibility is drugs.  Will this 25-year old Malaysian woman end up being the most influential person in the 21st century?  (The Norman Borlaug of the 21st century.)

screen-shot-2016-09-25-at-9-54-38-am

She is all of 25 and may have already made one of the most significant discoveries of our time.

Scientists in Australia this week took a quantum leap in the war on superbugs, developing a chain of star-shaped polymer molecules that can destroy antibiotic-resistant bacteria without hurting healthy cells. And the star of the show is 25-year-old Shu Lam, a Malaysian-Chinese PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne, who has developed the polymer chain in the course of her thesis research in antimicrobials and superbugs.

A polymer is a large molecule composed of several similar subunits bonded together. Polymers can be used to attack superbugs physically, unlike antibiotics that attempt to kill these bugs chemically and killing nearby healthy cells in the process.

“I’ve spent the past three and a half years researching polymers and looking at how they can be used to kill antibiotic resistant bacteria,” or superbugs, she told This Week in Asia, adding the star-shaped polymers work by tearing into the surface membrane of the bacteria, triggering the cell to kill itself. . . .

Her group is also examining the use of polymers as a drug carrier for cancer patients as well as the treatment of other diseases.

A key project at the moment is the synthetic transplant of cornea in the eye, which involves the use of polymers grown from the patient’s own cells in the lab to replace the damaged cornea.

The operation has already been tested multiple times successfully on sheep, and Qiao hopes to begin the first human trials in Melbourne within two years, working with the Melbourne Eye and Ear Hospital.

And from a bit more authoritative source (Science Daily):

The study, published today in Nature Microbiology, holds promise for a new treatment method against antibiotic-resistant bacteria (commonly known as superbugs).

The star-shaped structures, are short chains of proteins called ‘peptide polymers’, and were created by a team from the Melbourne School of Engineering.

The team included Professor Greg Qiao and PhD candidate Shu Lam, from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, as well as Associate Professor Neil O’Brien-Simpson and Professor Eric Reynolds from the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences and Bio21 Institute.

Professor Qiao said that currently the only treatment for infections caused by bacteria is antibiotics. However, over time bacteria mutate to protect themselves against antibiotics, making treatment no longer effective. These mutated bacteria are known as ‘superbugs’.

“It is estimated that the rise of superbugs will cause up to ten million deaths a year by 2050. In addition, there have only been one or two new antibiotics developed in the last 30 years,” he said.

OK, I know that preliminary research often looks promising in medicine, and that “more research is needed”—blah, blah, blah.

But even so, here’s a question for you infrastructure enthusiasts.  Which would do more for global utility in 2050, if you had to pick just one:

1.  Having the government spend $80 billion on a single (sort of) high-speed rail line from LA to the Bay Area?

2.  Funding 80 different research labs all over the world that are studying treatments for superbugs, at the tune of $1 billion each.

Another question:  Does it makes sense to go after China for “stealing” the idea behind an 80-year old Snow White film, based on a 200-year old European folktale, while constantly bashing the drug companies for high prices?


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19 Responses to “Utility in the 21st century”

  1. Gravatar of foosion foosion
    25. September 2016 at 06:38

    Her story is not plausible. Drug companies tell us they need extensive patent protection to develop drugs, so no student motivated by research could possible discover anything useful.
    [/sarcasm]

    “Does it makes sense to go after China for “stealing” the idea behind an 80-year old Snow White film, based on a 200-year old European folktale, while constantly bashing the drug companies for high prices?”

    No. IP protection is totally out of hand and should be sharply curtailed.

    Why can’t we have both infrastructure and research funding? If nothing else, take the rent extracted by drug companies, use part to fund research and the rest for other purposes.

    Consider the utility gain from having roads that are in good repair. Which would you rather do: drive a Ferrari on a heavily potholed road or a Porsche on a great road? Some people might be better off with higher taxes and more public spending.

  2. Gravatar of Gary Anderson Gary Anderson
    25. September 2016 at 07:25

    I think it is wonderful the work this woman is doing. And at 25 years old. The government won’t even dedicate money to stopping the Zika virus!

    High speed rail from SF to LA is a head scratcher. Maybe it is just getting too difficult and time consuming to do air travel between the two cities.

    It would make more sense to build a high speed rail from LA to Las Vegas at a much cheaper price.

    Scott, I sent you an email about Trump to your Bentley EDU address. I hope you get it and there is more. This is by far the most serious problem with Trump and the mainstream media is suppressing it. It has to be known by the public.

    If you care about defeating Trump this is worth your time, Prof.

  3. Gravatar of Scott Freelander Scott Freelander
    25. September 2016 at 08:28

    Scott,

    Does this mean you support Obama’s cancer cure moon shot? How about his big brain research initiative?

    I personally have no problem with the government funding so-called basic research. I don’t see the private sector jumping to build giant synchrotrons, like that at CERN, for example. Nuclear reactors and electronic computers were invented as part of government projects.

    On the other hand, so was the Concorde, which was never profitable. How to decide what government should do versus the private sector?

  4. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    25. September 2016 at 08:39

    But even so, here’s a question for you infrastructure enthusiasts. Which would do more for global utility in 2050, if you had to pick just one:

    1. Having the government spend $80 billion on a single (sort of) high-speed rail line from LA to the Bay Area?

    2. Funding 80 different research labs all over the world that are studying treatments for superbugs, at the tune of $1 billion each.

    Utility is an INDIVIDUALIST concept. There is no right answer in terms of specific content (rail or research). There is only a right answer in terms of form (who decides and exactly how is it decided)?

    Both of these proposals are rightly determined by individuals deciding how to allocate/invest their own money, provided it does not infringe upon other individual property rights.

    This is what utility IS for all individuals. Every other activity is exploitative and raises some people’s utility only at the expense of everyone else’s utility.

    Of course, there are plenty of people who identify their own utility by way of adopting an admiration for what statesmen do or do not do. So you have the pro-infrastructuralists like Sumner who are advocating that a socialist monetary rule is utility maximizing. This money infrastructure of course requires fincancing a monopoly on coercion, i.e. states. The costs for socialist money are the costs of maintaining whole states.

    These people understand their own happiness by how closely the state acts to brings it about.

  5. Gravatar of W. Peden W. Peden
    25. September 2016 at 09:11

    Scott Freelander,

    “How to decide what government should do versus the private sector?”

    For a start, check for crowding out effects. For instance, if corporations and wealthy individuals move into areas as the government cuts back spending (and move out if the government ramps up spending) then it’s a sign that it’s not a public good.

    Generally speaking, though, if something’s really worthwhile to people, people will be willing to pay for it without being forced to do so.

  6. Gravatar of Ray Lopez Ray Lopez
    25. September 2016 at 10:55

    MF is right: for every altruistic 25 yr old poster girl who does inventions for free, since it makes her feel happy or whatever, there’s a bunch of dirty older men who go into Wall Street quant research rather than science since there’s no money in science. We need better patent laws where it’s illegal to not give inventors their share (akin to illegal non-competition clauses in employment contracts that last forever), as well as giving ex post invention grants (akin to a Nobel Prize, even if no patent was filed) as well as “prizes” for patent-free inventions dedicated to the public (see the works of Alex Tabberok on this point).

    And Sumner is worried about Snow White? How quaint.

  7. Gravatar of Ray Lopez Ray Lopez
    25. September 2016 at 11:09

    @everybody – the South China Morning Post story is fluff. “However, Lam’s research is still in early stages, according to Qiao, and much more work needs to be done to verify the best formula and structure, as well as to reduce the dosage and further test toxicity before the substance is completely safe for the human cell.” – it’s not clear how a nanoparticle in the bloodstream which mechanically kills bacteria can be made to work in vivo (in the body) rather than in vitro (in a test tube). Lots of cancer drugs work in vitro but not in vivo, for example. I am guessing that they inject this polymer nanomaterial particles into your bloodstream, then filter your blood to remove the nanoparticles after they kill the super bugs. Not a bad idea, but not as convenient as just popping an antibiotic pill. Or, maybe they can make the nanoparticles ‘biodegrade’ after a while and get attacked and removed by your own body’s white blood cells? In any event, though the article implies bacteria cannot defeat this polymer (for now), nature always finds a way (‘life finds a way’ Jurassic Park) to defeat things like this. For example, the bacteria could change shape after N generations. Still, not a bad invention, too bad for her family she probably will get no money but just a nice job offer out of it, and fame. Not enough for most people IMO.

  8. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. September 2016 at 11:10

    Foosion, You said:

    “Why can’t we have both infrastructure and research funding? ”

    And how about free childcare for moms who work? And how about free health care? And let’s make college free.

    But what if we had to choose (and we do, as Americans don’t like paying lots of taxes). Which would we choose?

    Scott, You said:

    “Does this mean you support Obama’s cancer cure moon shot? How about his big brain research initiative?”

    No, I was burned by Nixon’s War on Cancer. But if I had to choose between infrastructure and medical research (Obama wants both) I’d choose research.

  9. Gravatar of engineer engineer
    25. September 2016 at 16:41

    “Does it makes sense to go after China for “stealing” the idea behind an 80-year old Snow White film, based on a 200-year old European folktale, while constantly bashing the drug companies for high prices?”

    It does not make sense to go after China for “stealing” the idea behind an 80-year old Snow White film….No absolutely not….

    Does it make sense for Disney to protect their trademarked innovative theme parks against imitators. Yes it does…in this country where they have been granted a trademark…but they have no case in China. Does it make sense for Disney to be critical of their Chinese competitors in China so that their potential customers can see the value to paying a little for the real thing…yes it does…

    In terms of the pharmaceutical industry, they and their governmental counterparts can stand a little public scrutiny. Doing an end run around the market based insurance reforms with higher prices and direct rebates to customers can stand a little scrutiny. The revolving door between industry and government regulators can stand a little scrutiny. Were the generic versions of the Epipen outlawed by regulators to help out Mylan or was it based on real concerns of their effectiveness? It is good and proper for people to ask questions. Nearly all of the innovation is being done by the biotech sector, while the big pharmaceuticals handle the politics and marketing of actually getting products to market. It seems to me people love to talk about the military industrial complex, but the NIH/FDA-BIG Pharma complex is just as big and I would say much more susceptible to corruption since regulators hold such power.

    In terms of infrastructure and transportations, I am very heartened by the change I see in the last couple of years, with Space-X and other companies opening up space transport, self-driving cars happening much faster than anyone would have expected a couple of years ago. I think the real application for the hyperloop systems could be taking the place of cargo trains and long haul trucking much faster than anyone could have predicted, but passenger systems also will make bullet trains obsolete.

    It seems to me that one thing that happens when the government gets involved in funding things is that companies stop spending their own money. Some money is spent to build prototypes to compete for future government contracts, but the big VC money is going to dry up. The company money mainly goes into government lobbyists instead and smaller companies are not likely to compete in this.

  10. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    25. September 2016 at 18:30

    “while constantly bashing the drug companies for high prices”

    For starters, it would be nice if everyone paid the same price for the same drug. Or even if every American paid the same price.

    It’s a huge blind spot for all the Republicans and Libertarians. Drug companies are being extremely aggressive in price discrimination between drug customers, usually based on market power of the buyer group, but also often the income of the buyer.

    Both of these mean that Obamacare customers and small businesses get screwed nine ways to Sunday. The average under-65 American gets screwed too, just not as badly.

  11. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. September 2016 at 19:29

    Engineer, I agree that the private sector is more effective than the government, at least when it comes to innovation.

    I never said there should be no scrutiny of drug companies, many of their practices are of dubious value. I was drawing a connection between our policies on IP in other fields, and our attitude toward drug pricing. That makes no sense.

    With drugs, at least there is an argument that high prices will save tens of millions of lives. That argument doesn’t apply to Mickey Mouse. Yes, it’s still a difficult and complex issue, but I’d at least like the critics of the drug companies to acknowledge that tens of millions of lives will be lost if we do not get drug prices right.

    Steve, You said:

    “For starters, it would be nice if everyone paid the same price for the same drug.”

    No, it would be evil. Millions of lives have been saved in the third world because consumers pay less for drugs to treat diseases like AIDS. Charge everyone the same price and the poor won’t be able to afford the drugs. Or if the price is low enough that everyone can afford them, then they won’t be invented in the first place. Thank God for price discrimination.

    That doesn’t mean I agree with all drug pricing, there are lots of inequities, areas where I might well agree with you. For instance, I think Americans should be free to buy drugs that have been approved in other countries, even if not available here. That would hold down the price of generics.

    Abolishing the FDA would be a great first step toward lower drug prices.

  12. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    25. September 2016 at 19:38

    I also said “Or even if every American paid the same price.”

    “Americans should be free to buy drugs that have been approved in other countries”

    Does this include re-importing drugs that are cheaper in other countries?

    If you think drugs should be publicly funded for the benefit of the whole world, then advocate publicly funded drug research, and clamp down on drug marketing expense. You’d have a good case.

    The problem is that nothing, absolutely nothing, about the drug market resembles a free market.

    Arguing consumers should shop in a “free market” whilst being mandated to be insured for all the most expensive drugs, all with monopoly protections and massive price discrimination practices with asinine list prices is a fig leaf that doesn’t pass the laugh test.

  13. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    25. September 2016 at 19:40

    It’s not just the drug market. Lack of price transparency is a problem throughout the whole health system. But we’re told “shopping” is the solution.

  14. Gravatar of ChrisA ChrisA
    25. September 2016 at 21:56

    Agree than directing the $80bn funding into new drug research labs would be far better than paying for a high speed rail boondoggle. But this approach still suffers from agency issues – many scientists are not the saintly types depicted in movies and would abuse the option either to pursue hobby horses, or straight up waste it through laziness/incompetence. In addition, presumably the labs funded would be ones that met with the approval of some government bureaucrat, so the ideas selected for research would be ones that made the bureaucrat look good, not necessarily the best ones. The better idea would be for the Government to commit to purchase $80bn worth of whatever drug met the specification desired. This would provide private enterprise with an incentive to do the research, and not artificially restrain the ideas being researched.

    In addition, I am not a utilitarian (because of all sorts of reasons), but I think this kind of moral calculations are OK. Basically you are saying, take the high speed rail proposal on its own moral justification, and using that same morality calculation basis, see what other approaches might be better. Thus you don’t need to be a utilitarian to agree.

  15. Gravatar of Steve Steve
    25. September 2016 at 22:30

    Agree with ChrisA, re the agency problem of publicly funded R&D.

    That said, even “innovative” biotech only spend 15% of revenue on R&D. So there’s room for publicly funded R&D to by 85% wasteful and still no worse than the current system.

    Also agree with ChrisA, there’s a better middle ground, where the government sets price and value objectives and lets the market try to satisfy those.

    The thing that really galls me, is that people who want open borders, free trade, and legal pot, would still have me arrested at the border if I drive to Canada to procure a year’s worth of prescription drugs for personal consumption.

  16. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    26. September 2016 at 05:34

    Steve, You said:

    “The problem is that nothing, absolutely nothing, about the drug market resembles a free market.”

    Indeed nothing about the entire health care system resembles a free market. Which is of course the problem. It’s a product of regulation and tax distortion. Let’s start by getting government completely out of the system, and then introduce the minimum of intervention. Say subsidies for the poor, and intellectual property rights for new inventions.

    And I assure you that biotech does not waste 85% of their revenue.

    ChrisA, I agree. I was not saying I favor the government spending $80 billion on drug labs (I don’t) just comparing that sort of waste with infrastructure boondoggles.

  17. Gravatar of Casz B Casz B
    26. September 2016 at 20:47

    @ ssumner:

    I’m not surprised that you got “burned by Nixon’s War on Cancer.” The ‘war on cancer’ is a fraud. And “Obama’s cancer cure moon shot” is absolutely an extension of the same fraud.

    Here’s why:

    The orthodox cancer establishment has been saying a cure for cancer “is just around the corner” and “we’re winning the war on cancer” for decades. It’s all hype and lies (read Guy Faguet’s ‘War on cancer” or Sam Epstein’s work).

    Since the war on cancer began orthodox medicine hasn’t progressed beyond their basic highly profitable, highly unsuccessful therapies: it still uses only highly toxic, deadly things like radiation, chemo, surgery, and drugs that have killed millions of people instead of the disease.

    As long as the official “war on cancer” is a HUGE BUSINESS based on EXPENSIVE TREATMENTS/INTERVENTIONS of a disease instead of its prevention, logically, they will never find a cure for cancer. The lucrative game of the medical business is to endlessly “look for” a cure but not “find” a cure. Practically all resources in the ‘war on cancer’ are poured into treating cancer but almost none in the prevention of the disease.

    At the same time, this same orthodox cancer cartel has been suppressing and squashing a number of very effective and beneficial alternative cancer approaches. You probably guessed why: effective, safe, inexpensive cancer therapies are cutting into the astronomical profits of the medical mafia’s lucrative treatments. That longstanding decadent activity is part of the fraud of the war on cancer.

    If the public were to scrutinize what the medical industry and their government pawns are telling them about the ‘war on cancer’ instead of blindly believing what they’re saying, they’d find that the cancer industry and the cancer charities have been dismissing, ignoring, and obfuscating the true causes of cancer while mostly putting the blame for cancer on the individual, denying or dismissing the serious harms from orthodox cancer treatments, and resorting to deceptive cancer statistics to “educate” (think: mislead) the public that their way of treatment is actually successful (read the well referenced epilogue of an article if you google “A Mammogram Letter The British Medical Journal Censored” and scroll down to the afterword).

    What the medical establishment “informs” the public about is about as truthful (=almost all lies) as what the political establishment keeps telling them. Not to forget, the corporate media is a willing tool to spread these distortions, lies, and the scam of the war on cancer.

    Does anyone really think it’s a coincidence that double Nobel laureate Linus Pauling called the ‘war on cancer’ a “fraud”? Anyone who honestly looks closer will come to the same conclusion. But…politics and self-serving interests of the conventional medical cartel, and their allied corporate media, keep the real truth far away from the public at large.

  18. Gravatar of morgan s warstler morgan s warstler
    28. September 2016 at 05:16

    Major, when you stay on the reservation, you do great work. This of course silences Scott on utility:

    “Utility is an INDIVIDUALIST concept. There is no right answer in terms of specific content (rail or research). There is only a right answer in terms of form (who decides and exactly how is it decided)?

    Both of these proposals are rightly determined by individuals deciding how to allocate/invest their own money, provided it does not infringe upon other individual property rights.”

    Scott, the correct version of your approach should be WHICH SYSTEM: Govt Spending OR Free Market is more likely to do SuperBugs vs Highway…

    Then you could say, “I Scott alone see more utility in SuperBugs, and they are more likely in Free Market (because yada yada)”

    But utility is not some easily measurable thing, but Im willing to let you measure it if you use my metrics!

    You’ve read Haidt’s Moral Foundations work… you know where you come down on his spectrum, so how do you a Utility Unit given you know fundamentally so many other types of people have a completely different morality than you do?

    Utility is dead.

  19. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    28. September 2016 at 08:09

    As long as the official “war on cancer” is a HUGE BUSINESS based on EXPENSIVE TREATMENTS/INTERVENTIONS of a disease instead of its prevention, logically, they will never find a cure for cancer. The lucrative game of the medical business is to endlessly “look for” a cure but not “find” a cure. Practically all resources in the ‘war on cancer’ are poured into treating cancer but almost none in the prevention of the disease.

    There is no ‘cure’ for cancer, because ‘cancer’ is a taxon of ailments, not a discrete illness. In 1970, the ratio of annual deaths to annual diagnoses (leaving aside skin cancers) was 0.63. As we speak, that ratio is 0.36.

    No clue why you’re expecting cancer ‘prevention’ when the causes of aught but a few cancers remain obscure.

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