But what's the harm here? The drug is safe. The only burden patients had was financial. Now what if the drug was effective? The harm it would incur to patients by delaying it would be much more extreme.
The FDA literally has no authority to set the price of anything. This comes up so often it's actually an FAQ on the FDA website. https://www.fda.gov/about-fda/center-drug-evaluation-and-res....
> We understand that high drug prices have a direct impact on patients—too many American patients are priced out of the medicines they need. However, the FDA has no legal authority to investigate or control the prices set by manufacturers, distributors and retailers.
The funding needs to move on to something that might actually work. Propping up these failed drugs with "what does it hurt" is in the way of getting an Alzheimer's drug that might actually benefit people.
I feel tremendously for patients and their loved ones frustrated with the FDA's sluggishness, but results like these illustrate why it's needed. Especially since many of the drugs have much worse side effects than this one.