求助prep1 44

w3d001

44.   (33799-!-item-!-188;#058&007092)



In countries in which new life-sustaining drugs cannot be patented, such drugs are sold at widely affordable prices; those same drugs, where patented, command premium prices because the patents shield patent-holding manufacturers from competitors.  These facts show that future access to new life-sustaining drugs can be improved if the practice of granting patents on newly developed life-sustaining drugs were to be abolished everywhere.



Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument?



(A) In countries in which life-sustaining drugs cannot be patented, their manufacture is nevertheless a profitable enterprise.

(B) Countries that do not currently grant patents on life-sustaining drugs are, for the most part, countries with large populations.

(C) In some countries specific processes for the manufacture of pharmaceutical drugs can be patented even in cases in which the drugs themselves cannot be patented.

(D) Pharmaceutical companies can afford the research that goes into the development of new drugs only if patents allow them to earn high profits.

(E) Countries that grant patents on life-sustaining drugs almost always ban their importation from countries that do not grant such patents

答案是d 但是我就是没有想明白。P 型company可以afford 研究新药，only if 让他们赚钱，怎么weak 呢？

genius_fang

D的意思是说那些药物研发的公司只会在专利保证他们能赚取足够的钱的情况下去承担研发新药的费用。