Bird Flu Mania

NOTE: Last night I wrote a much better article in the same vein as below, but then my aging computer had a minor stroke causing me to lose that post. It was really good.

It's time for me to push the potassium iodide (for that impending nuclear attack) aside in my bathroom and make room for flu masks and Tamiflu.

From what I have heard, I'm as good as dead from bird flu. Western Europe is the next stop, and obviously this thing is going to mutate into a human-to-human transferable disease. Just great; and top of this all, Roche, the makers of the best medicine against this mutant disease want us all to die because they didn't want to allow other companies to profit from their propriety medication. Hmm, freaking Swiss, first they hide Nazi gold and now this...

This all got me thinking; Roche owns the rights to make this stuff. The generics don't. Why should Roche turn over the rights to a product that they paid good money for (apparently they didn't develop it) and own the patent for? Why should Dr. Reddy or Barr Labs make a lot of money off of this? Because the world is panicking? Can Roche make enough to protect the whole world? Has anyone asked this question or are all the TV talking heads just sheep running around scared because there may be a wolf in the woods?

This is a public health issue; we can't have millions of people dying because Roche refuses to license the rights to these products, but really, where the hell where all the other companies when they were developing anti-flu medicine? Hey Cipla wants to sell an anti-bird flu pill or shot - great, get your R&D teams the money necessary and start slaving away; these things don't develop themselves over night. Naw, it's probably better business to wait for these crises to pop up, there is no development costs, your stock price is going to shoot up because you're making generic Tamiflu and best of all Roche gets screwed.

If Roche does license the rights to this, I hope the agreement is that the generic that makes it doesn't get one penny of profit from it - they can recoup their costs and that's it. If they really believe the crap that they are spewing about it being for the good of mankind, they will do it for the good of mankind. The generics can't play the capitalism card only when they need to lay people off...

It's actually probably in Roche's best interests to license some of the production. They are going to have to build up a significant stockpile in case this does mutate; then if it doesn't they're going to be stuck holding a pretty big ball. By licensing it they will protect themselves from the event that this global hysteria fest is wrong.

Oh, and please, don't buy any Tamiflu from "Dr. Doctor" who sends you that nice email telling you that he can also sell you Vi@gra and Ci@lis. Really, don't.

Eat, Drink and be Married

Ok, bad pun, oh well. As many of you probably know, I have recently wed. Since I don't have a post on the top of my head, ok, ok, not true I have a couple, but I figured I would get a little recap of the last 4 weeks of my life out there in the milky medium that is called blog-land.

Anyway, I will start you off with the typical "Happy Couple Leaving Site of Ceremony" (in our case the French mairie (or city hall for the 5 times more people that speak English as a first language than speak French as one.))

The wedding was a great success thanks to many factors including the fact that a number of my family members could make it across the ocean (I never liked the "pond" thing, I don't know why) to share this occasion with us.

After the wedding we went to the states to party like it was 199...ummm, wait, what do we say now? Stupid Prince, he really wasn't looking at the future when he wrote that song was he. Pfppt, only thinking nine years into the future...Anyway, in short we went to the states to hang out with the folks that didn't get to come over.

Due to the fact that my in-laws were with us, we decided to rent an Explorer (even with the price of gas I do not regret it - I would not have wanted to cram all of our junk into a Chevy Aveo.) Anyway, Julie wanted to snap a picture when we finally managed to get loaded up at JFK. I remember at the time grinding my teeth; having already traveled for 15 hours and it being only 3pm I felt it was prudent to get rolling (another 5 hours stood between us a shower, bed, or basically anything that resembled "home"). Anyway, thank you Julie because this is the only photo we have to prove we contributed a small part to Northeastern pollution.

After traveling to my parents house we continued our journey to see Boston - they were playing some rinky-dink club in Utica - ok not really, the actual city (or sub-city if you ask your average New Yorker). Anyway, I was still a bit jet-lagged, so it was a rough ride; plus it rained the entire length of the Mass Pike, at night. We finally get to BOS, we cruise through the city like it was the middle of the night (most likely because it was) and get to our wonderful 4-star hotel that I had reserved on Boston Bay. Finally, the trip is over, the hotel's lobby was great, we all wanted to crash...Actually I wanted a drink and then to crash. Unload 800 pounds of weary traveler gear, go to reception.
"Ah, Mr. Salo, yes nice to see you, how are you tonight"
"Mmm"
"Well, Mr. Salo, here's the thing...blah, blah, blah, yah, yah yah...no room...blah blah blah...y..[wait, I thought I just heard you say "no room"]"
"Yeah, well blah blah blah, yah yah yah, radar, blah blah, fog, blah blah, don't worry." The room was at/near Logan Airport.
At this point I think I was more-or-less incapable of worry, he assured me that he would find a hotel for me. Finally about 3 dog-hours later he came back and told me that they were going to put us up in a wonderful hotel that he didn't know of, but the guys who loaded and unloaded the bags would be able to help me find. Allegedly they will repay my usurped rooms for the night and I didn't pay the other room; so we had one night free in Boston. Not bad, I guess.
The next morning we went back to finally check into our real hotel...Different reception guy...I tell him my name...he laughs...they cancelled my reservation totally, not just one night but both. Anyway, the guy was very accommodating and managed to work it out after about 5 minutes. Here's the funny thing, I would stay there again. The hotel was on Boston Bay. Our rooms faced downtown...see this lovely photo that was taken from our window - really. And it was a four-star hotel, so the service wasn't what you find at Motel 6.

Anyway, I know this is a pretty lame post, but it beats the other one that has been up here for over a month. I have a couple of other things in mind...stay tuned.