Difference between revisions of "Amir Attaran"
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===Conference Proceedings=== | ===Conference Proceedings=== | ||
| − | *Dr Amir Attaran, Centre for International Development, Harvard University, Sir Richard Sykes DSc FRS, Chairman, GlaxoSmithKline plc, Dr Beatrice Wabudeya, Minister of State for Health, Uganda, ''[https://www.chathamhouse.org.uk/index.php?id=213&cid=10&type=conf The Pharmaceutical Industry: Squaring the Circle. Shareholder Value and Corporate Social Responsibility]'',Conference Proceedings, March 14, 2002. (Proceedings only available for purchase £295 and audio of conference only available to members). | + | *Dr Amir Attaran, Centre for International Development, Harvard University, Sir [[Richard Sykes]] DSc FRS, Chairman, [[GlaxoSmithKline]] plc, Dr Beatrice Wabudeya, Minister of State for Health, Uganda, ''[https://www.chathamhouse.org.uk/index.php?id=213&cid=10&type=conf The Pharmaceutical Industry: Squaring the Circle. Shareholder Value and Corporate Social Responsibility]'',Conference Proceedings, March 14, 2002. (Proceedings only available for purchase £295 and audio of conference only available to members). |
===General Articles=== | ===General Articles=== | ||
Revision as of 00:30, 18 June 2007
Dr. Amir Attaran is a lawyer who writes on public health and global development issues. He is a board member of Africa Fighting Malaria, a group funded in part by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).
A 2005 biographical note states that he is Associate Professor of Law and Population Health, and the holder of the Canada Research Chair in Law, Population Health and Global Development Policy at the University of Ottawa, Canada. It also states that prior to this he was an adjunct lecturer in Public Policy at Harvard University, publishing research as part of the Center for International Development and the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. "He has also advised and collaborated with numerous NGOs, UN agencies, governments, and corporations on aspects of international development, primarily in the area of public health," the biographical note states. [1]
Contents
Attaran & DDT
Attaran led a team of scientists in a seminal 2004 paper in The Lancet which forced the international aid donors to cease treating malaria with obsolete and ineffective drugs (chloroquine) and to instead use newer and highly effective artemisinin combination therapies, which WHO now agrees has saved a large number of childrens' lives[1]. Attaran also started the international campaign, which involved hundreds of scientists and Nobel laureates, to restore the indoors use of DDT in malaria control, and is credited with drafting the compromise in the Stockholm Convention which prohibited the ecotoxic use of DDT in agriculture, but allowed the life-saving use of DDT in public health [2].
Interestingly, in both the artemisinin combination therapy and the DDT cases, the WHO and other UN agencies now agree with Attaran and have come out in suppport of these tools being used. These and other successful campaigns to raise the standard of care for poor people in the world led the science journal Nature Medicine in 2006 to describe Attaran as "a master at bringing global health agencies to task"[3].
Dr. Attaran is also a forceful human rights advocate, having called for international prosecutions to end the crimes against humanity perpetuated by the regime in Zimbabwe[4], and recently having joined with NGOs to criticize Canada's military for failing to protect the rights of detainees they arrest during their mission in Afghanistan[5]. He is credited with the discovery that detainees captured by the Canadian Forces in Afghanistan have been transferred to the custody of Afghan security officials known by the Canadian government to be involved in torture[6].
Book
- Dr Amir Attaran (ed) & Professor Brigitte Granville (ed), Delivering Essential Medicines: The Way Forward, Chatham House , November 2004 ISBN: 1 86203 149 5 (paperback) 1 86203 150 9 (hardback)
References
- ↑ "African Health and Development: Are the Millennium Development Goals Helpful?:Speaker Biographies", American Enterprise Institute, September 12, 2005.
External Links
Biographical and Research Interests Notes
- Royal Institute of International Affairs, Dr Amir Attaran, biography, web archive from April 2005.
- "Amir Attaran: Canada Research Chair in Law, Population Health, and Global Development Policy", Canada Research, accessed June 2007.
Articles By Attaran
- Amir Attaran, Karen I Barnes, Christopher Curtis, Umberto d’Alessandro, Caterina I Fanello, Mary R Galinski,Gilbert Kokwaro, Sornchai Looareesuwan, Michael Makanga, Theonest K Mutabingwa, Ambrose Talisuna, Jean François Trape, William M Watkins, "WHO, the Global Fund, and medical malpractice in malaria treatment", The Lancet, Volume 363, January 17, 2004.
- Amir Attaran, "Where did it all go wrong?", Nature, Volume 430, August 19, 2004.
- Amir Attaran, "An immeasurable crisis? A criticism of the Millennium Development Goals and why they cannot be measured", PLoS Medicine, 2:e318 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0020318.
Conference Proceedings
- Dr Amir Attaran, Centre for International Development, Harvard University, Sir Richard Sykes DSc FRS, Chairman, GlaxoSmithKline plc, Dr Beatrice Wabudeya, Minister of State for Health, Uganda, The Pharmaceutical Industry: Squaring the Circle. Shareholder Value and Corporate Social Responsibility,Conference Proceedings, March 14, 2002. (Proceedings only available for purchase £295 and audio of conference only available to members).
General Articles
- Patent Politics, TAGline, Volume 8, Issue 9, November 2001.
- AIDS Activists Laud Pharmacia Plan for Generic Manufacturing", Dow Jones International: January 24, 2003.
- Consumer Project on Technology, Big Pharma's favorite academics and opinion makers, accessed February 2004.
- Steve Sternberg,, "The troubling fight against old killer", USA Today, April 29, 2004.
- Roger Bate, "What Patent Problem?: Dr. Amir Attaran asks — and answers — the question", National Review Online, May 17, 2004.
- A Critique of Amir Attaran's claims about patents and medicine access, [7], [8], [9].
- John W. McArthur, Jeffrey D. Sachs, Guido Schmidt-Traub1, "Response to Amir Attaran", PLoS Medicine, November 29, 2005.
- Erika Check, "Profile: Amir Attaran" Nature Medicine, July 27, 2006.
