CHIEF CRITICS
Bioethicists, physicians and clinical trial researchers have all raised concerns about allowing people to bet on drug trials and FDA approvals. Researchers told Stat News that financial incentives could encourage people with influence over a study to alter or delay decisions, and could shift the focus away from discovering accurate medical evidence and toward influencing market outcomes. They said it could also influence patients, who may decide to withdraw or stay in a study based on betting odds rather than medical advice. People with privileged knowledge—such as company employees, clinical investigators, doctors or nurses—could use nonpublic information to place profitable bets before results are announced and even if regulators later detect insider trading or market manipulation, the trial itself may already have been compromised.
Read more White House Says It Has ‘Handle’ On Cyclosporiasis Outbreak—While Urging Precautions
CONTRA
Kalshi argues the markets will make public pharmaceutical information that is usually kept under lock and key. By creating prediction markets, the company says experts, investors, physicians, scientists and informed observers will be able to collectively translate that information into a single, public probability that anyone can see. Reuters summarized the initiative as making “drug-development odds public for the first time.”
Read more ‘No Reprimands’ For Blue Angels Flyover That Ripped Past Pensacola Beach, Navy Secretary Says
BIG NUMBER
$128,401. That’s the trading volume under Kalshi’s “medicine” market as of about 3 p.m. Thursday.
Read more Trump May Target China In Primetime Election Security Speech: What We Know
further reading
ForbesTrump’s Teleprompter Operator Suspended For Allegedly Betting On His SpeechesBy Sara Dorn
ForbesGeorge Santos Under Investigation Over Kalshi Bet On His Own State Of The Union AttendanceBy Conor Murray