time limits are being gamed to infinity
> "Evergreening" is a pejorative term used to refer to the practice of extending the length of patent protection beyond the statutory term of 20 years, most often used in the context of pharmaceutical patents. Although drug companies do engage in creative strategies to maintain sales levels for as long as possible, criticisms of evergreening are largely overstated. In fact (with relatively reasonable exceptions), patents generally cannot be renewed or extended. In the vast majority of cases, so-called "evergreening" will only be a successful strategy to the extent that consumers can be persuaded to purchase the newer, pricier, patented version of a product rather than the older, cheaper, unpatented one.
(The author is on the faculty at Harvard medical school.)
Subtlety here: the consumers aren't making the choice, it's the insurers or medicare. We can't simultaneously accept the arguments "medicare will ruin drug development because it's the only consumer" and "consumers are choosing to purchase newer drugs making evergreening effective".
"there are endless examples of this type of “evergreening"
"With a surprisingly large number of expensive “evergreened” drugs, one need look no further than the person in the mirror (and his or her doctor) if one wishes to avoid paying a much higher price for essentially the same medicine."
"Pharmaceutical companies, it seems, have been very successful in convincing consumers and doctors that the newer version is worth the extra cost."
The author is suggesting that there's no problem because consumers can in theory avoid the problem, but as he points out, they don't. Evergreening is a very prevalent and effective strategy to separate patients from their money.
they have machinery in place to "persuade" consumers and medical staff that prescribe
Let's say you're right. Then shouldn't we solve that instead of jumping straight to price controls?