Pharmaceuticals

160 mn. Fell into Poverty during Pandemic as 10 Wealthiest Men doubled Wealth to $1.5 Trillion (Oxfam)

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The charitable organization Oxfam reports this week that 160 million people fell into poverty during the past two years of pandemic, while the richest 10 men in the world doubled their wealth from $700 billion to $1.5 trillion. The authors of the report argued that this is not simply a […]

Addiction

Opioid Crisis: Purdue Pharma/ Sackler Family Fails in End Run around Justice

F. Douglas Stephenson

Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) – In a seismic victory for justice and accountability that re-opens the deeply flawed recent September, 2020 settlement of the Purdue pharma bankruptcy case, the Sackler family will be forced to confront the pain and devastation they have allegedly caused. Judge Colleen McMahon of the U.S. District Court for […]

Brazil

Our Health depends on Indigenous Botanical Knowledge and Plants that are rapidly being Destroyed

John Buell

Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – While mainstream media celebrate the remarkable development in record time of vaccines spectacularly effective against the Covid virus, knowledge that might contribute to other medical breakthroughs is being steadily undermined. This decline is not the result of some dramatic lawsuit or corporate takeover. It is one of […]

Epidemics

Public Citizen: It Turns out Pfizer-BioNTech Vaccine depends Heavily on Publicly-Financed Research

John Buell

Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – Public Citizen recently uncovered “an agreement that the European Commission reached with Pfizer and BioNTech last November to purchase 100 million doses of the companies’ mRNA vaccine, which was developed with the support of https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-09/pfizer-vaccine-s-funding-came-from-berlin-not-washington”> government funding and U.S. taxpayer-financed technology. In the 104-page contract, Public Citizen […]

Epidemics

Can President Biden’s planned Waiving of Covid Vaccination Patents: begin a grassroots movement against Big Pharma?

John Buell

Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – When the Biden Administration announced it would no longer oppose suspension of Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) standards regarding production of COVID vaccines and therapies, there was joy in the world health lobby and anguish in the big pharma camp. Understandable as these reactions […]

Epidemics

Pfizer and Big Pharma need to waive Patents on Covid-19 Vaccine to Save the World

John Buell

Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – It is a familiar story. A Pharma giant sells life- saving vaccine , which costs no more than 7 dollars a dose, to most nations at almost 20 dollars per shot. Knowing that unseemly profits in the midst of a global pandemic may elicit outrage and perhaps […]

Mental Health

In our Time of Insurrection and Divisive Violence, can Psychedelics help in Peace-Building?

Thomas Buonomo

Washington, DC (Special to Informed Comment) – In July 2020 the US Institute of Peace published a report titled “Violent Extremist Engagement and Reconciliation: A Peace-Building Approach”. In the wake of riots in several cities across the country that summer and the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection that the House of Representatives impeached Donald Trump […]

Health Care

Is it Time to end Profiteering on Public Health and Nationalize Big Pharma?

F. Douglas Stephenson

Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) — Over forty years of profiteering by Big Pharma and oligarch control of our economy has left the public totally exposed and ill-prepared to face the public health crisis of COVID-19. Because Big Pharma rarely invests in prevention, it has very little motivation to invest in preparedness for a […]