Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2017 December 18

= December 18 =

circuit breaker
I was looking at my fuse panel but couldn't figure what the rating of each circuit breaker is. I see the voltage but can't seem to find the amperage. Am I blind or is the amperage not written anywhere on the circuit breaker? Mũeller (talk) 03:54, 18 December 2017 (UTC)


 * (Google is your friend here; just start throwing text from the label into the search bar.) They appear to be Merlin Gerin miniature circuit breakers.  The model/type number is C45N, and the amperage is 10 amps (leftmost, 'C10' designation) or 16 amps (the others, 'C16').  The 'C' refers to the type of overload that will trip the breaker and indicates that it is designed for conventional, general-purpose loads.  See here, describing some related products. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 04:25, 18 December 2017 (UTC)


 * What type and where is the service? --DHeyward (talk) 09:58, 18 December 2017 (UTC)


 * Is there anything immediately above the abbreviation AMP that's repeated above each breaker? --69.159.60.147 (talk) 01:03, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

How fast could a specialized company produce generic drugs on demand?
I recently read an article that some drugs are mighty expensive in the US even though the patents have expired years ago because there is only one manufacturer for making drugs for such rare deseases. So I was wondering, in these days of crowdsourcing and on-demand, how hard it would be to manufacture drugs on demand. Say you are a pharmaceutical company and have a state-of-the-art factory and laboratory. I call you one day because I need albendazole to treat a hookworm infection. How fast could you create some pills for me to treat the infection if all you had was access to the patent? (PS: If someone starts a crowdfounding pharmaceutical company that produces pills on demand after reading this question, they agree to pay me 1% of their earnings and give me credit for the idea ). Regards  So Why  13:56, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * In the U.S., or any other country with regulation of pharmaceuticals, a while, because before you are able to legally sell the drug you need regulatory approval. In the U.S., for a generic drug this involves submitting an Abbreviated New Drug Application. Note (as stated in the article) this involves conducting a clinical trial to establish that your drug is equivalent to the original. While we're on the U.S., it's illegal to import medications into the U.S. unless you have FDA approval to sell the medication, so your hypothetical company can't legally just import albendazole from a foreign manufacturer and sell it in the U.S.; you would still need to submit the ANDA. Here's a PBS story discussing this. (Although it's technically illegal for individuals in the U.S. to import medications for their own use, the government looks the other way as long as you have a prescription, if it's a prescription drug, and it's a reasonable quantity for personal use, which is why there are a bunch of Canadian pharmacies making online sales to U.S. residents.) The price issue in the U.S. is because the U.S. doesn't have price control mechanisms for medications, unlike most developed countries. --47.157.122.192 (talk) 20:03, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Does the Canadian government subsidize those cheap drugs? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 21:18, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * In a very broad sense, pharmaceutical drugs are less expensive in Canada compared to the US not because of government subsidies, but rather because of government price controls. Gnome de plume (talk) 21:30, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Price controls typically lead to shortages, especially if foreigners are buying them. How do they get around that? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 21:50, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * In Australia the price of prescription drugs is regulated and prices have been falling since I've need them. i get my blood pressure meds for about $15 now, they were $32 12 years ago. Greglocock (talk) 04:09, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Citation? It's called Econ 101. See Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 11:23, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Once all the R&D is done, the marginal cost of producing a given drug is very low, and below any reasonably-regulated price (and hence the elasticity of the supply is almost zero). Hence already-developed drugs will not be in shortage by that process; the R&D is a sunk cost at the moment the manufacturer must decide to produce or not. (However, drug companies may decide not to develop new drugs, anticipating a regulated price below the breakeven cost.) Tigraan Click here to contact me 12:34, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Bingo. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:12, 19 December 2017 (UTC)


 * In the U.S. I don't pay more than $5 for 30 days supply of generics ramipril or carvidolol from Walgreens. Prices have also come down.  My cost is significantly less than the copay ($10) indicating the medication is very inexpensive.  The problem with price controls is that for medications that are regulated outside of demand, there will be no incentive to make.  No company is going to make a drug that costs more to make than the price controlled selling point.  The only way to overcome it is with subsidies but that destroys the logic of price controls in the first place.  --DHeyward (talk) 06:27, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the replies. I'm aware of the regulatory hurdles but my question was more of a theoretical one. Assuming those regulations did not exist or getting certification was a matter of minutes (just checking whether your manufactured drug contains the same active ingredients or something like that), how quickly could you actually produce those pills? Regards  So Why  08:31, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
 * As fast as your machine could make them. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 08:51, 19 December 2017 (UTC)


 * It's not a bounded enough question. The sophistication of the required process will vary greatly between medications.  Tooling up for a specific medication so that you have the capability of making a single unit can be time consuming and expensive.  Single unit capability is least amount of material and equipment needed.  Pharma companies are very aware of the barrier to entry cost and plan pricing accordingly.  When there is only a single "high priced" source for a rare, patent-expired medication, it's pretty much guaranteed that it's priced at a point that prevents other companies from getting into the market.  If that were not the case, drug makers around the world would try to capitalize on it.  After you have the capability to make at least one unit, follow on orders might be faster.  Illegal pill mills for MDMA and illicitly manufactured fentanyl have everything including pill presses that replicate the pharmaceutical markings.  The replica pills are good enough the law enforcement now sends medications to be tested rather than rely on markings and people are dying from a fentanyl analogue overdose when they think they are taking oxycodone.  Those illicit labs seem to be able to ramp up quickly after they get the recipe down and precursor chems are available.  If the precursor is something like unicorn tears, it's obviously a much more difficult, time consuming and expensive problem.  --DHeyward (talk) 09:07, 19 December 2017 (UTC)


 * In Britain drugs used by National Health are assessed by National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). The drugs are sold at a standard price on prescriptions but the actual cost to the National Health can vary - it can even be cheaper. If a drug is very expensive or not too useful then NICE may simply say it is not overall worthwhile and any use has to be by private medicine. In other cases it will encourage the use of generic drugs by doctors to cut prices. They're quite keen to get medicines cheaper by any means as saying they won't supply a drug because of cost can lead to bad publicity. Dmcq (talk) 11:51, 19 December 2017 (UTC)


 * In freer countries like the People's Republic of China there is a substantial business in custom drug syntheses. The New York Times links http://www.guidechem.com/ http://www.cecchem.com/ and http://www.qjy168.com/ as examples.  The U.S.-based coverage generally focuses on their willingness to do syntheses of relatively new substances that have not yet been banned (which is obviously criminal!) or in some cases actually has been, and so they still talk about months separating the request for a synthesis from delivery.  I don't know how quickly they could respond with a genuinely new chemical not used as an illicit drug; I'd guess something quick might be possible.  Bear in mind that there are obvious trade-offs that would be involved - the NYT says a site advertises GC purification and ">99% purity" (the second part of which actually is not a very reassuring guarantee!) but obviously that purification would increase the lead time. Wnt (talk) 11:39, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Project lifecycle
Why does the Network Rail Governance for Rail Investment Projects (GRIP) have more stages in the earlier parts of the project lifecycle, compared to other similar frameworks such as RIBA or OGc? 82.132.228.171 (talk) 14:42, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Where have you seen that info? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:04, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
 * This is the same London-area user who posted the construction safety question above, they asked about RIBA under the other IP back in April. It doesn't seem they are interested in followups or asking clearly answerable questions. μηδείς (talk) 04:02, 19 December 2017 (UTC)