If you continue all drug-funding efforts via your insurance company, etc, the way things are done will never change.
If instead we pooled the money we would spend and payed the companies to do the research directly they wouldn't deserve ownership (it being work-for-hire) and society would directly benefit.
Besides, it's not like patents work. Too often a real inventor loses all protection because of a filing error, and too often patents just enable squatting.
If patents weren't absolutely horrible for business and consumers we'd need to figure out a better replacement. But the way it is even just removing them totally would be better for everyone except abusers.
