John, did you see this?
The cure for coronavirus could be held hostage by Gilead. The pharma giant owns the patent for remdesivir, a drug that could be the treatment the world is waiting for.
But Gilead is infamous for selling life-saving drugs at eye-watering rates that individuals and governments can’t afford. And if we let it hog this patent, it likely won’t be able to produce enough remdesivir to meet global demand.
John, we can’t let Gilead get away with this -- so we’re taking this to the skies.
Your donation today will pay for a plane to fly right over Gilead San Francisco HQ’s with a bold message for its CEO: “Stop trying to make a profit from the coronavirus!”
Can you chip in to get this off the ground?
Donating just takes a moment -- use Paypal or your card.
Yes! I'll chip in $1 to make sure coronavirus drugs will be available to all.
Thanks for all that you do,
Anne and the team at SumOfUs
Here's the email I sent yesterday with more information:
John,
We could be close to a breakthrough in the search for a cure for the coronavirus. The most likely candidate: Gilead’s drug Remdesivir.
But Gilead wants to keep exclusive control over the drug’s patent.
And that’s bad news because Gilead is notorious for price gouging. It charges $1000 for a single pill of its hepatitis C drug!
But here’s the good news: right now all eyes are on Gilead -- the company is extremely sensitive to public pressure. And John, this is where you come in.
With your help, we’ll charter a plane to fly over Gilead's headquarters and the whole of San Francisco to send a strong message to Gilead’s bosses: “Stop trying to make a profit from the coronavirus!” We’ve found someone who can fly a plane for just under 5000 US Dollars.
And this won’t just get the attention of Gilead: it will be splashed all over the news, including all the big financial newspapers -- and Gilead’s bosses and shareholders will be freaked out by this negative publicity.
Donating just takes a moment -- use Paypal or your card.
Can you chip in $1 to make sure coronavirus drugs will be available to all?
If we don’t win this and Gilead keeps exclusive rights to its drug, the treatment will be extremely expensive and out of reach for many people and countries around the world.
And just as important: there won’t be enough of it for everyone. Experts say Gilead would not be able to produce the huge quantities of the drug that we need to meet global demand.
The only solution is for Gilead to share its data and let other countries and manufacturers develop generic versions of the drug -- this will make it cheap and widely available. And that’s exactly what we need to save lives and beat this global pandemic.
I don’t have to tell you how important this is.
If Gilead keeps a monopoly, it would mean it could block generic development of the drug until 2031.
2031!
That will be too late for too many people. So we'll start with the plane and won't stop until Gilead gives in -- but we can only do it with your help:
Donating just takes a moment -- use Paypal or your card.
Can you chip in $1 for a free coronavirus cure for all?
