The key challenge confronting biopharma in 2018 is the disconnect between an abundance of transformative science and a hidebound commercial and regulatory model that continues to place barriers to making the right medicines accessible to patients who need them. It’s a structural problem in the delivery and financing of health care overall, but one that impacts biopharma disproportionately by adding to the cost of drug development, denting the benefits of innovation and diminishing the industry’s reputation as a force for social good.
Solving for the imperfections that guide institutional behavior – can human health provision ever be anything but “messy”? – will...