This is cool. I frequently find that medical people (at least in America) are intentionally ambivalent towards how much things cost - charitably, for patient care at least, you want the highest quality care for everyone, and skimping on cost could compromise someone's health. The idea that something being more expensive makes it more scarce, as obvious as it would seem, is often a secondary consideration.
Example: My wife is in surgery, and has told me how surgical tools often come billed as a set. Rather than being able to bill for a single tool, if an operation requires another duplicate of the same tool the surgeon will often just open an entire new set.
Another example: In college I build a tDCS machine [1] for about $20. I knew a doctor from the VA who was working in the area who showed me one with essentially the same circuit which sold for $80,000 - essentially for the stamp of approval from the FDA to use it in a clinical research setting.
There are reasonable-sounding explanations for both things I guess, but the obvious consequence is that the number of people able to receive care is dramatically lower. I feel like there are probably similar analogies in technology, but maybe they are more easily disrupted because of lower regulatory barriers.
[1] https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/psychiatry/specialty_areas/b...
Example: My wife is in surgery, and has told me how surgical tools often come billed as a set. Rather than being able to bill for a single tool, if an operation requires another duplicate of the same tool the surgeon will often just open an entire new set.
Another example: In college I build a tDCS machine [1] for about $20. I knew a doctor from the VA who was working in the area who showed me one with essentially the same circuit which sold for $80,000 - essentially for the stamp of approval from the FDA to use it in a clinical research setting.
There are reasonable-sounding explanations for both things I guess, but the obvious consequence is that the number of people able to receive care is dramatically lower. I feel like there are probably similar analogies in technology, but maybe they are more easily disrupted because of lower regulatory barriers.
[1] https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/psychiatry/specialty_areas/b...