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On the Soapbox: At a Time of High Priced Medicines and a Global Pandemic - How Do We Make Medicines Accessible and Affordable to All?
Session Chair(s)
Merith Basey, MSc
Executive Director, North America
Universities Allied For Essential Medicines (UAEM), United States
The Covid-19 pandemic has shed light on what the access to medicines movement has known for more than 20 years - the profit-driven models used to research and develop medicines have led to a system that has failed almost everyone, everywhere. People all over the globe from all backgrounds, ethnicities, levels of status and wealth have been impacted, and will continue to be. Alternative needs-driven, people-centered models already exist and the role of public funds and universities is critical to their success. We are living in a unique global moment with a common enemy that we will need to face - strongly and together in solidarity - or we will inevitably experience further pandemics in our lifetimes, including the greater challenge of facing a pandemic in the form of antimicrobial resistance. All of us are vulnerable, although unequally. More urgently than ever the global need for collaboration and solidarity is being felt by people who had never before paid attention to these issues. Almost everyone, everywhere is waiting for drugs and vaccines that can change lives, history and the current narrative. And an urgent question needs to be answered: who will eventually get access to them and in what order?
Learning Objective : Discuss ways the current biomedical R&D model we use to make medicines has failed people; Describe the critical role public funds and universities play in the development of life-saving medicines, vaccines etc; Identify what alternative models already exist and what action can be taken and what campaigns, actions and opportunities exist.
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