Global Walt Vernon is CEO of US-based healthcare facilities consulting firm, Mazzetti, and non-profit, Sextant. He is on the Board of the FGI and served on NFPA 99 ELS, NFPA 70 CMP15, and ASHRAE 189.3. He chairs the ASHRAE Infectious Aerosols Position Document Committee and represents the US in the International…

Africa Medicines for Africa’s Lenias Hwenda highlights the vast gaps in COVID-19 vaccine access globally, especially in Africa where just six percent of the population has been vaccinated. Hwenda argues that the time is now to boost the infrastructure for pharmaceutical manufacturing in Africa as a way out of this pandemic,…

Global On the 100th anniversary of the development of insulin, regular PharmaBoardroom contributor Brendan Shaw* examines the shocking global disparities in access to the lifesaving drug, but does not point the finger of blame at the pharmaceutical industry. Instead, Shaw highlights the high barriers of entry that dissuade these companies from…

Mexico Writing in the November issue of DIA Global Forum, Lawrence Liberti, Mario Alanis, Pravin Chopra, and Silvia Bendiner examine how the COVID-19 pandemic facilitated greater inter-stakeholder collaboration across the healthcare ecosystems in Cuba and Mexico, and how the learnings from this period can be leveraged for better patient outcomes moving…

Australia In conversation in the November issue of DIA’s Global Forum magazine, Australian Pharmaceutical medical and scientific Professionals Association (APPA) Past President David Grolman highlights the contributions that Australia is already making to the global innovative pharmaceutical industry and why his country remains a particularly attractive clinical trials hub.   “We…

Europe In the wake of the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), sustainability is once more a hot-button issue across all industries, including pharma. Here, Marco Rauland, vice president global market access & pricing strategic planning at Merck Group, casts his eye across Europe to assess how sustainability criteria are…

Europe Cyril Titeux, senior VP mid-sized markets EMEA & strategic leader at Janssen, argues that the current focus of many health systems on efficiency, streamlining, and reducing spending is leaving them ill-prepared to absorb the shock of future crises. Titeux instead posits the need for the building up of resilience and…

UAE Amgen MEA’s Mohamed Nasser* examines the current pharma commercialisation model, posits how the entire healthcare ecosystem’s rapid and effective response to COVID-19 could be replicable in other disease areas, and makes his predictions for the industry’s future direction.   Probably more than at any other time in history, the last…

USA Susan L. Lang outlines how pharma companies can navigate drug formulary exclusions, numbers of which have been rising in recent years, and ensure that newly FDA approved medicines can make it to consumers.   The pipeline for new therapies at the Food and Drug Administration mostly consists of novel brand…

Canada In conversation in the October edition of DIA’s Global Forum magazine, Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH) CEO Suzanne McGurn highlights how the work of HTA bodies like CADTH has evolved, the most significant challenges in their work, international collaboration, and RWE integration.   Health technology assessment…

Japan Writing in the October edition of DIA’s Global Forum magazine, Chief Executive of Japan’s Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency (PMDA) Yasuhiro Fujiwara outlines how his agency has begun to utilise real-world data (RWD) and real-world evidence (RWE) in its regulatory decision-making processes and how this will evolve moving forward.  …

Global Shawview Consulting’s Brendan Shaw examines the WHO’s recently released updated Essential Medicines List. Shaw highlights some of the key trends and new inclusions in the List, why pricing and transparency are hotter topics than ever, and how pharma can incorporate this important document and its implications into their strategies for…