Penicillin had to undergo decade long R&D to go from Fleming's petria dish to a cheap practical drug - I cannot find the article now but I believe the investment levels from the US Military were compared to Manhattan (obviously poorly compared) but the point is this was not the "gosh what luck" story it is in mass media.
Having made that first breakthrough, world class teams across the globe fought to bring the efficiency up from "froth on the top of a brew" to "gallons of the stuff"
Florey was a big part of the story but so were teams in US and Europe and then the US military scaled it up beyond belief.
We spent money, targeted money, on the best teams globally and then put serious industrial might to it once they found the answers.
That exact approach is what I am calling for again.
And as for patents - if enough global effort is put in, with enough government funds, the pressure to put the results "in public hands" rather than hold out for patents is really strong
Having made that first breakthrough, world class teams across the globe fought to bring the efficiency up from "froth on the top of a brew" to "gallons of the stuff"
Florey was a big part of the story but so were teams in US and Europe and then the US military scaled it up beyond belief.
We spent money, targeted money, on the best teams globally and then put serious industrial might to it once they found the answers.
That exact approach is what I am calling for again.
And as for patents - if enough global effort is put in, with enough government funds, the pressure to put the results "in public hands" rather than hold out for patents is really strong
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_penicillin