By Timo Minssen Please find below my welcome speech at last-weeks mini-symposium on “Legal dimensions of Big Data in the Health and Life Sciences – From Intellectual Property Rights and Global Pandemics to Privacy and Ethics at the University of Copenhagen (UCPH). The event was organized by our Global Genes –Local Concerns project, with support from the UCPH Excellence Programme for Interdisciplinary Research….
The New York Times Magazine has just published an interesting piece on the Nonhuman Rights Project and Steven Wise, whose mission is to change the common law status of at least some nonhuman animals from “mere things” to “legal persons.” (I have previously written on their work here). It is widely agreed, among both advocates and opponents of…
In the past few months, the Copenhagen Zoo has killed a giraffe and four lions in order to protect the genetic health of their breeding populations, generating significant international backlash and highlighting difficult questions about the value of species preservation. The international controversy surrounding the zoo’s actions began in February, when it killed a healthy…
Yesterday, the International Court of Justice ruled that the Japanese government must halt its whaling program in the Antarctic pursuant to its obligations under the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling. At issue in this case was Article VIII of the Convention, which allows a member state to issue permits authorizing the killing of…
On Wednesday, the Food and Drug Administration announced that 25 pharmaceutical companies that manufacture animal drugs will participate in voluntarily phasing-out the use of antibiotics for growth promotion purposes in farm animals. The companies are acting in response to voluntary guidelines that the FDA issued in December, requesting that the companies change their labeling of…
A few weeks ago, the New York Times Magazine ran a fascinating piece titled “The Mammoth Cometh,” which tells the story of a growing number of scientists around the world who are working on projects of “de-extinction.” Significant progress has been made, and some scientists estimate that we will be able to revive certain species,…
[Ed. Note: On Friday, the Petrie-Flom Center, the Food Law and Policy Clinic (a division of the Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation), the Food Law Lab, and the Harvard Food Law Society (with support from the Top University Strategic Alliance and the Dean’s Office at Harvard Law School) co-sponsored a conference at HLS called “New Directions for Food Safety: The Food Safety…
Is hard paternalism in medicine ever justified? In a recent NYT op-ed titled “When Doctors Need to Lie,” cardiologist and author Sandeep Jauhar provides a thought-provoking perspective on this question. Dr. Jauhar begins with a description of a case in which the father of a 22-year-old patient requested that Jauhar temporarily lie and tell the…
The USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has released a Draft Environmental Impact Statement associated with its deregulation of a new generation of genetically modified herbicide-resistant crops. While many in the agricultural industry hail this as a much-needed step in the development of new weed-control technologies, critics worry that it will accelerate an…
Last week, the Food and Drug Administration finalized a long-awaited guidance document that aims to reduce non-therapeutic uses of antibiotics in livestock production and thereby limit the evolution of drug-resistant bacteria. As I discussed in a previous post, the use of antibiotics in livestock production is often not for the therapeutic purpose of curing disease,…
