Suchergebnisse

Regulatory diversity and the patenting of life -- The promise and perfidy of patents -- Origins of the patented species : of mice, men, and the sincerity of 'invention' -- The global governance of trade : trading in political ethics -- TRIP'ing over human rights : the legitimacy crisis at the WTO -- The sovereign right to self-determination : from agency to development and dignity -- Reconciling competing international obligations : the equitable conduct defence and the stewardship of the WTO

Ethn Dis. 2022;32(2):149-150; doi:10.18865/ed.32.2.149

Ethn Dis. 2022; 32(1):69-72; doi:10.18865/ed.32.1.69

The patenting of human genetic materials provokes wide‐ranging misgivings about the appropriate place and scope of intellectual property protections. The issues implicated range from anti‐competitive practices in the market, the imposition of limits on biomedical research, increasing costs for health care, research ethics, potentials for racial discrimination, and various violations of human rights. Exploring controversies around the Human Genome Diversity Project, patents on genetic sequences, and patents on higher life forms such as the so‐called "Harvard mouse," the authors find that North American patent policy has developed in the absence of necessary political debate. They link this de‐politicization to the hegemony of neo‐liberal principles most fully demonstrated by the incorporation of intellectual property under international trade negotiations. They point, however, to the recent emergence and increasing audibility of new social movements that seek to reposition issues of intellectual property in larger debates about human rights, distributional equalities, and social justice.

Historically, the US immigration system (ie, institutions, agencies, and laws) has served the goals and principles of white supremacy through its treatment of globally displaced people and this appears to have continued through the COVID pandemic. Yet, the implications for immigrant health are not routinely addressed in mainstream public health discourse, and especially so in regard to public health disasters. This study conducted a series of focus groups with participants from social justice organizations working with immigrants, migrants, undocumented persons, refugees, persons seeking asylum, and persons detained in immigration jails to collect stories on how the immigration system undermined efforts to control the spread of COVID-19 and exacerbated health inequity within immigrant jails and across related community contexts during the pandemic. Focus groups were conducted to explore issues related to immigrants and immigration detention during the COVID-19 pandemic. There was a total of N=14 participants across the 4 focus groups with a dedicated focus group on perspectives of Black immigrants/from Black immigrant organizations only. Each focus group consisted of 3 to 4 participants. Five key themes emerged: 1) dehumanization of immigrants and migrants and devaluation of their lives; 2) inhumane conditions of confinement that propagate risk of disease; 3) denial of resources for COVID-19 prevention and mitigation; 4) expansion of intersecting oppressive systems; and 5) community-based resistance and mobilization against immigration policies and enforcement. Our findings highlight the harms from policing, criminalization, and exclusion that racialized communities face as a result of the (in)actions within the immigration system during a public health disaster including the COVID context.

Inadequate attention to racial health equity is a common challenge to effective, reliable monitoring and mitigation of COVID-19 disparities. Efforts to monitor and miti­gate COVID-19 disparities continue to be hampered by inadequacies in how surveil­lance systems collect, tabulate, and report COVID-19-related outcomes. We conduct­ed environmental scans of existing public health surveillance systems and reporting standards, literature reviews, focus groups with surveillance experts, and consulta­tions with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and an expert panel on surveillance to identify and explore strengths, weaknesses, and gaps in how ex­isting systems monitor COVID-19 and their implications for addressing disparities in related outcomes. We present recommen­dations based on these reviews and propose a core minimum set of health indicators and best-practice standards for reporting these indicators by COVID-19 surveillance sys­tems to monitor racial/ethnic and other dis­parities in the pandemic. These recommen­dations are relevant to monitoring disparities in the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and may inform monitoring of future epidemics. This discussion is part of an effort by Project REFOCUS to develop syndemic surveil­lance systems for monitoring the intersecting pandemics of COVID-19 and racism. Ethn Dis. 2022;32(2):151-164; doi:10.18865/ed.32.2.151

Introduction: The general public was discussing racism and potential inequities in COVID-19 vaccinations among Afri­can Americans on Twitter before the first COVID-19 vaccine received emergency use authorization, but it is unclear how US state health departments (SHDs) were using Twitter to address the inequities. This study examines the frequency, content and timing of SHD tweets during the US rollout of the first SARS Co-V2 vaccine.Methods: This was a prospective study of tweets posted from the official Twitter ac­counts of each of the 50 US SHDs and the DC health department from October 19, 2020 to February 28, 2021. We retrieved the content and metadata of 100% of their tweets; calculated frequencies and propor­tions of tweets containing key terms related to COVID-19 vaccines, equity and racism; stratified the data by region; and charted longitudinal trends.Results: Overall, SHDs tweeted infrequent­ly, and rarely tweeted about inequities, mis­trust or racism. Though 55.48% of all SHD tweets were about COVID-19, hardly any tweets contained the terms: race/ethnic­ity (1.20%); equity (1.09); mistrust (.59%); or racism (.06%). Similar patterns existed among vaccination-related tweets, which accounted for 24.38% of all tweets. Only 21.64% of vaccination-related tweets con­taining any race/ethnicity, equity, mistrust, or racism terms were posted prior to the first Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). Those about African Americans (70.45%) were posted ≥8 weeks after EUA.Conclusions: Concerns about racism and inequities in COVID-19 vaccination continue on Twitter, but SHDs rarely tweet about them. This strikes a worrisome chord of disconnection from the science linking health inequities to racism.Ethn Dis.2022; 32(3):257-264; doi:10.18865/ed.32.3.257