Real answers · The family’s gifts to the world
Why was insulin’s patent sold for $1?
The real answer
Its discoverers wanted no one to be able to secure a profitable monopoly on it. In April 1922 they wrote to the university that a patent would serve only to stop anyone else from patenting it, and on January 1, 1923, three of them assigned the patent to the University of Toronto’s Board of Governors for one dollar (the University of Toronto’s Fisher Library).
A century later, a Medicare drug plan may not apply its deductible to a covered insulin, and since 2023 the copay has been capped at $35, or less from 2026 (42 U.S.C. § 1395w-102(b)(9)).
The house’s version
Seen here: insulin. Its discoverers sold the patent for a dollar, so that no one could make a monopoly of it. A dollar was their price. The family has had a century to think of others. The law now caps what Medicare’s members pay for it, at $35; the rest of you are welcome to call us.
A parody, from Donate now.