Editor’s Note: On the anniversary of Treaty Day (September 15th, 1832), when the Ho-Chunk Nation ceded Teejop to the United States, Maeleigh Tidd presents her final contribution to the Points Pharmaceutical Inequalities feature. In this post she explains the historical connection between the Ho-Chunk tribe and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and proceeds to discuss how UW are commemorating their shared past and future through specific initiatives, particularly within the School of Pharmacy and the education it provides.
Pharmaceutical Inequalities
Right Wing Psychedelia with Dr. Brian Pace and Dr. Neşe Devenot
Amanda Pratt spoke with Dr. Brian Pace and Dr. Neşe Devenot on July 7, 2022 about an article they recently published in Frontiers in Psychology titled “Right-Wing Psychedelia: Case Studies in Cultural Plasticity and Political Pluripotency.” A contribution to the Pharmaceutical Inequalities series, this audio interview sheds light on an oft-neglected aspect of psychedelic history that is essential to understand when considering the business and culture of psychedelics. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
How can Pharmacists improve gender-affirming care? An insider’s perspective
Editor’s note: Maeleigh Tidd continues to explore the role of pharmacists in the provision of gender-affirming care for LGBTQ+ people, and return to the Pharmaceutical Inequalities series with an interview of Dolyn Salm, a transgender pharmacy student at the University of Wisconsin Madison School of Pharmacy. They discuss Dolyn’s experiences of navigating the US healthcare system during his transition, and his views on how pharmacists can be better prepared to support the needs of LGBTQ+ patients. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
History of LGBTQ+ Health and Ongoing Health Disparities & Inequalities
Editor’s note: Maeleigh Tidd returns with another contribution to the Pharmaceutical Inequalities feature, this time co-authored with a graduate student colleague, Lucy Abrams. Mae and Lucy discuss the history of LGBTQ+ health in the USA, and situate existing LGBTQ+ rights within the international context. They subsequently discuss how pharmacists play a key role in providing gender-affirming care, and how this can be improved upon. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
The Indigenous Medicine Conservation Fund: a new paradigm of benefit-sharing in the burgeoning psychedelic science ecosystem
Editor’s Note: Anny Ortiz returns with a third contribution to our Pharmaceutical Inequalities series with reflections on her recent trip to the Medical Psychedelic House of Davos to co-present alongside her colleagues from the Indigenous Medicine Conservation Fund and launch their ‘Grow Medicine’ project. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
I recently returned from a 10-day trip to Switzerland and Canada. I was in Toronto, Canada at a conference called “From Research to Reality” co-presenting a poster titled “5-MeO-DMT: Synthesis and therapeutic potential for treating psychological disorders”. It was surprising to see that there were two separate presentations by personnel from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), one of which was titled “Challenges in Conducting Clinical Research with Schedule I Psychedelics: From the 1960s to the Present”, presented by Dr. Katherine Bonson, and the other titled “World Regulatory and Policy Discussion: A Pathway Forward”, presented by Javier Muniz. If FDA staff presenting at a psychedelic science conference is not a sign of the times, I don’t know what is.
Immediately preceding the Toronto conference, I was in Davos, Switzerland, as part of the Indigenous Medicine Conservation Fund (IMCF), which was a sponsor of a landmark event titled “Medical Psychedelic House of Davos” (no connection to the World Economic Forum, usually hosted in Davos). I would like to share some highlights of what transpired there.
Pharmacy stakeholders’ perceptions of opioid use disorder vaccines
Editor’s Note: Amanda Pratt’s first contribution to our Pharmaceutical Inequalities series offers this insightful interview with Vincent Wartenweiler PharmD, an independent community pharmacist and Master’s student in Psychoactive Pharmaceutical Investigation at UW-Madison. Amanda (AP) and Vincent (VW) sat down on March 24, 2022 to discuss a qualitative project Vincent published in 2021 to determine perceptions of pharmacy stakeholders around opioid use disorder vaccines. In addition to providing a glimpse into a significant milestone for the history of alcohol, drugs and pharmacy–the development of substance use disorder vaccines–this interview sheds light on potential methodologies for understanding vaccine hesitancy. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
Women’s Fight for Sexual & Reproductive Health Rights
Editor’s Note: In light of the forthcoming US Supreme Court decision on Dobbs v Jackson, Maeleigh Tidd provides her third contribution to the Pharmaceutical Inequalities series which considers its implications for women’s access to reproductive healthcare. In doing so, she reaches back to the 19th century to explore American women’s historical access to, and use of, contraception and abortion. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
As we approach the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court ruling a women’s liberty to have an abortion, we were struck with a leaked draft of the Supreme Court’s opinion of overturning this Constitutional right for women. But, perhaps, this is only the beginning of the regression of women’s rights to sexual and reproductive health.
Disparities & Inequalities in Ending the HIV Epidemic: Treatment of HIV
Editor’s Note: Maeleigh Tidd delivers another thought-provoking post in our Pharmaceutical Inequalities series. She reaches back to the 1980s to consider how ACT UP protests led to greater affordability of HIV drugs, and argues that the persisting structural inequalities must be addressed by EHEI. The Pharmaceutical Inequalities series is funded by the Holtz Center and the Evjue Foundation.
In 1987, six-years into the rampant spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and progression of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) leading to 40,000 deaths in the U.S., the FDA approved the first known antiviral drug for the treatment of AIDS. The approval of AZT (zidovudine) was the first scientific breakthrough in treating, and potentially ending, this “death sentence” of a disease. Yet, as the only treatment option available to the growing number of vulnerable and dying individuals with HIV/AIDS, it was outrageously unaffordable with a price tag of over $10,000 per year.
This drug profiting and the overall poor response to the epidemic at hand, led to the formation of the non-partisan group Aids Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP), a group of LGBTQ+ activists ‘united in anger and committed to direct action to end the AIDS crisis’.