Global Health & Human Rights

  • Read more: Upcoming Event: Larry Temkin speaking on “Global Poverty: Why Should We Care?”

    Upcoming Event: Larry Temkin speaking on “Global Poverty: Why Should We Care?”

    By The Petrie-Flom Center Want to know more about the ethics of aid? Want to hear the inspiring talk that’s convinced students across the northeast to take global poverty seriously? Join Harvard High-Impact Philanthropy for our first talk of the semester with ethicist Larry Temkin! RSVP here for Global Poverty: Why Should We Care? a talk by…

  • Read more: Safe Surgery Checklists May Raise Unintended Ethical and Legal Questions, Especially in Low-Resource Settings

    Safe Surgery Checklists May Raise Unintended Ethical and Legal Questions, Especially in Low-Resource Settings

    By Matt Baum The WHO Surgical Safety Checklist is unusual as a patient-safety intervention in that it has been widely promoted as universally effective, i.e. effective both in high-income and resource-limited settings; checklists are now used in approximately 1800 hospitals worldwide. In a paper recently published in the journal, BMJ Open, Aveling and colleagues report the…

  • Read more: Police and Public Health in Partnership

    Police and Public Health in Partnership

    By Scott Burris The Global Commission on HIV and the Law recently conducted a web discussion of steps to implement the Commission’s recommendations for better harmonizing law and HIV control.  One of the questions for discussion was: What are examples of innovative or non-traditional partnerships that can be used to strategically advance human-rights based responses…

  • Read more: “How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Test Tube Meat (and Started Thinking It May Be Immoral NOT to Eat It)” Or “Hooray For Chickie Nobs!!??!!”

    “How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Test Tube Meat (and Started Thinking It May Be Immoral NOT to Eat It)” Or “Hooray For Chickie Nobs!!??!!”

    By I. Glenn Cohen If you were watching television this week you may have seen this clip of a taste test for hamburger meat grown in a “test tube” in London discussed here. The meat was grown from stem cells from existing cows used to grow 20,000 strands of tissue. Costing more than $330,000 to…

  • Read more: How global regulations are written

    How global regulations are written

    By Kevin Outterson In secret, during “trade” negotiations. Just one example: the 12 years of data exclusivity for biologics is currently US law, but that may get carved into stone in the new Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TIIP). Once enshrined in a trade agreement, this rule and thousands more will be immune to change…

  • Read more: India Aggressively Expanding Access to Medicines

    India Aggressively Expanding Access to Medicines

    By Ryan Abbott The Indian Federal Department of Pharmaceuticals has released a new Drugs (Prices Control) Order that expands the list of “essential” drugs subject to government price control. Currently, a 1995 order restricts prices on 74 bulk drugs and their formulations; the new order would control prices on a total of 348 medicines that…

  • Read more: Transplant Tourism: Hard Questions Posed by the International and Illicit Market for Kidneys, New Article I Wrote

    Transplant Tourism: Hard Questions Posed by the International and Illicit Market for Kidneys, New Article I Wrote

    By I. Glenn Cohen [Cross-Posted at Prawfsblawg] The Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics has just published an article by me on transplant tourism, that discusses the burgeoning international market for buying and selling kidneys. I review the existing data from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India, which is pretty deplorable. As I show the vast majority…

  • Read more: 4/25: Boston-Wide Forum on Global Access Licensing of Biomedically Relevant Technologies

    4/25: Boston-Wide Forum on Global Access Licensing of Biomedically Relevant Technologies

    By Adriana Benedict Universities Allied for Essential Medicines (UAEM)Boston-Wide Forum on Global Access Licensing of Biomedically Relevant Technologies Thursday, April 25th, 3-5pmCoffee and refreshments at 2:45pm; reception following the eventHarvard Medical School New Research Building – 77 Avenue Louis PasteurSeminar Room 1031 How do innovative medical technologies make their way to a global population, including…

  • Read more: Of Evergreening and Efficacy, Part III

    Of Evergreening and Efficacy, Part III

    By Ryan Abbott This is the last in a three-part series (Part I, Part II) of posts I’ve written about the case between Novartis and the Union of India, in which the Supreme Court of India denied Novartis a patent for its anti-cancer drug Glivec. Today I’m continuing the discussion of the practical outcome of the case….