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Public Health Crisis (public + health_crisis)

Distribution by Scientific Domains
Law and Criminology60%
Medical Sciences40%

Selected Abstracts

Patents and Pharmaceutical R&D: Consolidating Private,Public Partnership Approach to Global Public Health Crises

THE JOURNAL OF WORLD INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, Issue 4 2010
Chidi Oguamanam
Intellectual property (IP) is a reward and incentive market-driven mechanism for fostering innovation and creativity. The underlying, but disputed, assumption to this logic is that without IP, the wheel of innovation and inventiveness may grind to a halt or spin at a lower and unhelpful pace. This conventional justification of IP enjoys, perhaps, greater empirical credibility with the patent regime than with other regimes. Despite the inconclusive role of patents as a stimulant for research and development (R&D), special exception is given to patent's positive impact on innovation and inventiveness in the pharmaceutical sector. This article focuses on that sector and links the palpable disconnect between the current pharmaceutical R&D agenda and global public health crises, especially access to drugs for needy populations, to a flaw in the reward and incentive theory of the patent system. It proposes a creative access model to the benefits of pharmaceutical research by pointing in the direction of a global treaty to empower and institutionalize private,public partnerships in health care provisions. Such a regime would restore balance in the global IP system that presently undermines the public-regarding considerations in IP jurisprudence. [source]

In Defense of Asbestos Tort Litigation: Rethinking Legal Process Analysis in a World of Uncertainty, Second Bests, and Shared Policy-Making Responsibility

LAW & SOCIAL INQUIRY, Issue 1 2009
Jeb Barnes
A central question in American policy making is when should courts address complex policy issues, as opposed to defer to other forums? Legal process analysis offers a standard answer. It holds that judges should act when adjudication offers advantages over other modes of social ordering such as contracts, legislation, or agency rule making. From this vantage, the decision to use common law adjudication to address a sprawling public health crisis was a terrible mistake, as asbestos litigation has come to represent the very worst of mass tort litigation. This article questions this view, arguing that legal process analysis distorts the institutional choices underlying the American policy-making process. Indeed, once one considers informational and political constraints, as well as how the branches of government can fruitfully share policy-making functions, the asbestos litigation seems a reasonable and, in some ways, exemplary, use of judicial power. [source]

Individual differences in the drive to overeat

NUTRITION BULLETIN, Issue 2007
M. M. Hetherington
Summary, Obesity is considered a public health crisis. In order to tackle this, an enhanced appreciation of what drives some consumers to overeat is required. It is clear that several features of the modern environment encourage over-consumption in many people, at least some of the time. However, there is variation in the extent to which this translates into weight gain. Understanding whether susceptibility is dispositional or learned will shape prevention and treatment programmes. This review identifies situational cues that promote overeating and dispositional traits, such as impulsivity and sensitivity to reward, which make some individuals specifically vulnerable to overeating. These traits are likely to contribute to the development of the obese state, but also present barriers to weight management. Personalised nutrition and behavioural strategies may provide a novel and innovative approach, as these take account of individual differences in vulnerability to overeating. [source]

Policy on global warming: fiddling while the globe burns?

AUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH, Issue 4 2009
Del Weston
Abstract Objective: To assess the extent that the health consequences of global warming and the responses to it take due account of its impact on poverty and inequality. Method: Reviewing the relevant literature on global warming, proposed solutions and the impact. Results: To date, too little attention has been paid to the health consequences arising from the increased poverty and inequality that global warming will bring. When these are combined with issues arising from the economic melt-down, food shortages, peak oil, etc. we are heading for a global public health crisis of immeasurable magnitude. Conclusion: Solutions lie in rethinking the global economic system that we have relied upon over the past several decades and the global institutions that have led and fed off that global system , the IMF, the World Bank and so on. Implications: Public health practitioners need to look and act globally more often. They need to better recognise the links between global warming and the global financial crisis. How the latter is dealt with will determine whether the former can be resolved. It is in this global political economy arena that future action in public health lies. [source]