The affordability of publicly funded medicines has been a longstanding concern. In 2023, the Biden administration took several steps on this front, including incorporation of a price constraint in an agreement between the US Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. to develop a new COVID-19 monoclonal antibody.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis article contrasts the different approaches to COVID-19 vaccine development adopted by Oxford University, on one hand, and Texas Children's Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine (collectively, Texas), on the other hand. Texas was praised widely in the press and academic literature for adopting an "open source" approach to vaccine development. Oxford, however, chose to license its vaccine technology to pharmaceutical manufacturer AstraZeneca and received significant public criticism as a result.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe perspectives of genomic citizen scientists on ownership of research outputs are not well understood, yet they are useful for identifying alignment of participant expectations and project practices and can help guide efforts to develop innovative tools and strategies for managing ownership claims. Here, we report findings from 52 interviews conducted in 2018 and 2019 to understand genomic citizen science stakeholders' conceptualizations of, experiences with, and preferences for ownership of research outputs. Interviewees identified four approaches for recognizing genomic citizen scientists' ownership and related credit interests in research outputs: shared governance via commons models; fractional ownership of benefits; full and creative attribution; and offensive and defensive patenting.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPublic genealogy websites, to which individuals upload family history, genealogy, and sometimes individual genetic data, have been used in an increasing number of public health, epidemiological, and genetic studies. Yet there is little awareness among researchers of the legal rules that govern the use of these online resources. We analyzed the online Terms of Use (TOU) applicable to 17 popular genealogy websites and found that none of them expressly permit scientific research, while at least 13 contain restrictions that may limit or prohibit scientific research using data obtained from those sites.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Empir Res Hum Res Ethics
September 2021
This study examines knowledge, attitudes, and communication practices toward genomic data sharing among principal investigators and research coordinators engaged in cancer and non-cancer studies. We conducted 25 individual semi-structured interviews and conducted a qualitative thematic analysis. Most interviewees had basic knowledge of data sharing requirements, but lacked specific details of recent changes to NIH policy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnnu Rev Genomics Hum Genet
August 2020
Citizen science encompasses activities with scientific objectives in which members of the public participate as more than passive research subjects from whom personal data or biospecimens are collected and analyzed by others. Citizen science is increasingly common in the biomedical sciences, including the fields of genetics and human genomics. Genomic citizen science initiatives are diverse and involve citizen scientists in collecting genetic data, solving genetic puzzles, and conducting experiments in community laboratories.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOver its 30 or so years of existence, the genomic commons-the worldwide collection of publicly accessible repositories of human and nonhuman genomic data-has enjoyed remarkable, perhaps unprecedented, success. Thanks to the rapid public data release policies initiated by the Human Genome Project, free access to a vast array of scientific data is now the norm, not only in genomics, but in scientific disciplines of all descriptions. And far from being a monolithic creation of bureaucratic fiat, the genomic commons is an exemplar of polycentric, multistakeholder governance.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNIH's new genomic data sharing (GDS) policy covers both human and model-organism genotypic and phenotypic data, and strives to balance rapid release of data with embargo periods to ensure that data producers have sufficient time to analyze their results. But how well does the policy achieve this balance?
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe International Serious Adverse Events Consortium is generating novel insights into the genetics and biology of drug-induced serious adverse events, and thereby improving pharmaceutical product development and decision-making.
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