Children Synthesize Two Dollar Version of Martin Shkreli’s $750 Malaria Drug
On 30 November 2016, the Sydney Morning Herald reported on a of a class of high school boys from the Sydney Grammar School, who (as part of a collaboration with university scientists) synthesized pyrimethamine, the active ingredient in the drug Daraprim (once used as an antimalarial, now primarily used to treat toxoplasmosis and cystoisosporiasis).
Daraprim gained notoriety in September 2015, when Turing Pharmaceuticals (then run by Martin Shkreli) purchased the rights to its distribution and raised its price from $13.50 a tablet to $750.00.