Beneficiaries of Cancer Financials

Put simply, the British public pours £millions into cancer research and we celebrate when there is a breakthrough. It then takes years for the drugs to be made available to the NHS at an extortionate price.

Recap: the public pays for the research then the public pays again for the results - or not, because there's not enough money to cover the costs incurred by the pharmaceutical company. Specific costs include further development, testing, manufacture, packaging and sales commissions; shared costs include constantly upgrading laboratories, staff salaries, general business costs and shareholders profits.

What is the money cycle? This is not a factual statement, not even an educated guess, I am just wondering... 

• Charity donations presumably passed to universities and non-profit trusts to aid research?
• Do the pharma companies then have to bid for the research information or is it given freely?
• If no one buys the drugs, does the whole investment get written off as a loss? 
• If so, wouldn't it be better to halve the cost of drugs to the NHS and recoup some of the expenses? 

Compassion and emotion drive the campaigns, creating a demand for solutions and providing the blueprint in terms of research information, but commerce controls the engine. The NHS holds the role of completing the circle by bringing the benefits of cancer research to the British public.

There is an imbalance of power. The moment that Joe Public hands over the money, any control over its onward journey has gone. This applies both to cancer research donations and to compulsory NHS contributions.

Who has a workable solution?