College of Law > About > Centers & Institutes > Mary and Michael Jaharis Health Law Institute > Jaharis Podcast

The Jaharis Podcast on Health & IP

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
Jaharis Podcast
Welcome to the Jaharis podcast on health and intellectual property. Our series explores current topics related to health law & policy and intellectual property. In each episode, our Jaharis Faculty Fellow will interview a leading figure doing cutting-edge work at the intersection of health and IP.  Gene editing technologies, precision medicine, 3-D printing, drug price increases, and strategies to fight antibiotic resistance are just a few of the areas in which these two dynamic legal fields increasingly intersect with one another.

​Latest Episodes

Genetic Testing and Predictive Health Analytics

January 07, 2021

Featuring Sharona Hoffman, Case Western Reserve University

The ever-growing phenomenon of predictive health analytics is generating significant excitement, hope for improved health outcomes, and potential for new revenues. Researchers are developing algorithms to predict suicide, heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cognitive decline, opioid abuse, cancer recurrence, and other ailments.

Integrating Health Innovation Policy

January 07, 2021

Featuring Rachel Sachs, Washington University

The United States healthcare system is highly fragmented. This fragmentation creates opportunities for multiple actors to make healthcare decisions that would be made better by a single actor, such as when patients receive care from many uncoordinated providers, or when patients move on and off of different insurance plans over time.

Balancing Wealth and Health

January 07, 2021

Featuring Rochelle Cooper Dreyfuss

A talk about a book that focusses on the debates concerning aspects of intellectual property law that bear on access to medicines in a set of developing countries. Specifically, the contributors look at measures that regulate the acquisition, recognition, and use of patent rights on pharmaceuticals and trade secrets in data concerning them, along with the conditions under which these rights expire so as to permit the production of cheaper generic drugs.

The Cost of Novelty

November 23, 2020

Featuring Nicholson Price, University of Michigan Law School

Nicholson Price’s paper "The Cost of Novelty" argues that patent law advances new, rather than better. Market value, on which IP law relies, systematically values some goods differently than a social planner or a committee of scientists might. 

The Case for Disclosure of Biologics Manufacturing Information

November 09, 2020

Featuring Yaniv Heled, Georgia State University School of Law

Yaniv Heled’s paper "The Case for Disclosure of Biologics Manufacturing Information" asks whether the law could require disclosure of manufacturing information of biologics. The discussion surrounds public use in data vs public good in incentivizing innovation by keeping information confidential.

Genetic Duties

October 28, 2020

Featuring Jessica Roberts, The University of Houston, Director of the Health Law & Policy Institute

Jessica Roberts’s paper "Genetic Duties" discusses genetic Variants of Uncertain Significance (i.e a finding that has been identified through genetic testing, but whose significance to the function or health of an organism is not known), whether patients should be informed about them once their significance is discovered, and whose duty it is to let patients know.

To the Moonshot and Beyond: Cancer and IP
Featuring Jacob Sherkow from New York Law School

Jacob Sherkow from the New York School of Law is our first guest. His recent work focuses on intellectual property and information policy issues surrounding efforts to cure cancer. We discuss patents, the role of public-private partnerships in cancer R&D and the Cancer Moonshot Initiative.

Exploring the Microbiome
Featuring Rachel Sachs from Washington University Law

In this episode we explore the microbiome -- the world of microbes inside your body. Rachel Sachs from the Washington University School of Law in Saint Louis joins us to discuss intellectual property issues surrounding the microbiome, including emerging treatments and therapies that are starting to take advantage of microbiome research.

Fighting Antibiotic Resistance
Featuring Kevin Outterson, Executive Director of CARB-X

More than 23,000 people die every year in the US from antibiotic-resistant bacteria. We welcome to the podcast Kevin Outterson, executive director of CARB-X (Combating Antibiotic Resistance Bacteria Biopharmaceutical Accelerator), a USD 450 million partnership that is taking the lead in protecting humanity from bacterial threats.

Federally Funded Research: Approaching Four Decades of the Bayh-Dole Act
Featuring Lisa Ouellete, Associate Professor at Stanford Law School

In 1980, Congress enacted the Bayh-Dole Act, which is often considered the "basis of the biotech revolution." In this episode, we explore the impact of patents on federally funded research at universities and other institutions in the wake of Bayh-Dole with Lisa Ouellete, who has written extensively on the topic.

Medicine of the Future: From Biologics to Black Box Medicine
Featuring Nicholson Price, Assistant Professor of Law at University of Michigan Law School

Biologics are often hailed as the most promising drugs currently available to patients. However, they are extraordinarily difficult to replicate, a feature that poses unique problems to competitors and regulators. Today we talk with Nicholson Price about this issue and about “black box” medicine: what happens when we rely on algorithms for diagnostics or to identify therapies?

Investor-State Arbitration and “Alternative Facts” in Pharmaceutical Marketing
Featuring Cynthia Ho, Clifford E. Vickrey Research Professor and Director, Intellectual Property Program at Loyola University Chicago School of Law

Cynthia Ho provides an overview of two different fields with implications for public health. We start by discussing international agreements that allow foreign companies to bring claims against states on the grounds that their investments—including those in the form of intellectual property, such as pharmaceutical patents—have been compromised. We then talk about Cynthia’s latest article, in which she argues that, in some situations, pharmaceutical marketing to doctors may be considered “alternative facts” and therefore entitled to less First Amendment protection.


​