The Jaharis Podcast on Health & IP

Stigma, Bias and Discrimination: How Can They Harm Our Health?

Can stigma and discrimination affect our health? What is the rationale behind the blood ban policy and how does it promote stigma and discrimination against healthy gay men? Should the FDA abolish the blood ban policy? I really enjoyed discussing these questions with Doron Dorfman Associate Professor of Law at Syracuse University College of Law. We also thoroughly discussed his latest piece The PrEP Penalty which is forthcoming in Boston College Law Review. The Article uses an innovative experimental study to demonstrate counterintuitive and illogical responses to gay men’s use of PrEP, a highly innovative treatment that significantly reduces HIV infection. Even when participants in the study are educated about the health benefits of the PrEP treatment, on average, they are more reluctant to personally accept blood donated by a gay man who is taking PrEP compared with a gay man not taking PrEP. The findings illustrate how decisions related to public health are colored by moral judgment. As Doron explains, this is detrimental not only to LGBTQ individuals but also to society as a whole.

Gun Violence is a Public Health Crisis

December 13, 2021

Is gun violence pandemic a public health problem? Is there a relationship between gun violence and mental health crisis in the USA? why are poor and segregated neighborhoods disproportionately affected by gun violence in the USA? I really enjoyed discussing these questions with Michael Ulrich, Assistant Professor of Health Law, Ethics, & Human Rights at Boston University’s School of Public Health and School of Law. With Michael we also discussed his latest piece Second Amendment Realism, Forth in Cardozo Law Review which delves into the public health policy implications of the District of Columbia v. Heller case. In this seminal case the Supreme Court said that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms, unconnected with service in a militia, for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Michael also speaks about his academic path, the challenges he faced throughout his academic journey and the advice he gives students that aspire to pursue a career in the field of health law and public health. Don't miss this fascinating discussion!

Immunity Passports and Contact Tracing Surveillance

Featuring Ignacio N. Cofone, Assistant Professor and Norton Rose Fulbright Faculty Scholar at McGill 

Contact tracing apps and immunity passports are being used for the first time in human history. This Article assesses their risk tradeoffs from a private and regulatory law perspective, with special attention to privacy and inequality. The Article begins by developing a surveillance-based taxonomy of contact tracing apps and immunity passports. Next, it demonstrates how these apps magnify the problems and limits of consent and anonymization, two important privacy guarantees. It then explores how the interplay of trust and error can pose threats to health and business efficacy, how they raise issues of liability, and how to address them. It then discusses the prospect that these apps cause discrimination and magnify existing inequalities. Underpinning the aforementioned considerations is a balancing assessment that aims to guide policy-makers, judges, employers, and individuals in making difficult containment decisions.

Am I My Cousin's Keeper? A Proposal to Protect Relatives of Genetic Database Subjects

Featuring Robert I. Field, Professor of Law and of Public Health at Drexel University; Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics at the University of Pennsylvania

Proposing a new regulatory mechanism, “Data Protection Review Boards” (“DPRB”), to balance genetic innovation and Users' privacy. Based on the model of Institutional Review Boards (“IRB”), that oversee the protection of human subjects in research, DPRBs would review data-sharing arrangements between database companies and other private entities with an exclusive focus on privacy risks to data subjects and their identifiable relatives.

Genetic Testing and Predictive Health Analytics

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

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

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

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

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

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.