The Food and Drug Administration is hated second only to the FBI and its dealings in Waco among Austin libertarian dreamers. The dreamer faction basically believes that the FDA is controlled by pharmaceutical companies and only permits dangerous and expensive drugs to make efficacy claims and go to market. Reality is different. If the FDA were to privatize tomorrow and all their findings were to be made advisory instead of legally binding, they would not change any procedure they use to evaluate drugs. No one would want them to.
Medicine is complex, and thus expensive, by nature.
AIDS is not going to going to evacuate the body by simple behavior modification. Parasitic flukes do not cause cancer. The FDA faces this sad reality every day, but libertarian dreamers simply refuse. The pharmaceutical industry is a favorite Libertarian whipping boy when it should be a Libertarian hero. The best example of quality major scientific research accomplished mostly in the private sector is found in the pharmaceutical industry.