A large proportion of pharmaceutical development is funded (directly or indirectly) by public funds. There's a very strong argument that single-payer healthcare systems should issue a blanket moratorium on buying new patented medicines and direct the funds to research. Major pharmaceutical companies spend significantly more on marketing than on R&D, so it'd be a net win for the taxpayer if they just paid for drug development directly.

Well, I can think of a few countries that might find it worthwhile to invest in the health of their citizens. In America we’ll have to make it part of the department of defense in order to get it funded.

I suppose for the same reason people still create movies, despite the fact that they are easily copied and expensive to produce.

RoI may go beyond financial measures for some of us.

I'd invest even if the only yield is longer/better life rather than $.

More $ - not terribly important beyond a threshold.

Longer/better life - yeah, that's important no matter how much money I have.

Yes I agree with you. Apparently it wasn't obvious from my /s, but the entire narrative around this is absurd.

There are people in this thread who seem to be both decrying capitalism, and also asking that extremely rich venture capitalists fund the projects with their riches.

It's absurd. Capitalism has given us the most prosperous, longest living, most peaceful grouping of people in the history of mankind. The drugs these people are synthesizing exist BECAUSE of capitalism.