Public Lecture- Dr. Matthew Flynn
On Thursday, November 12th at 5:30 in the Russell Union Room 2048, Dr. Flynn will be giving a public lecture entitled “The Dilemma of High-Priced Medicines.”
Matthew Flynn, Ph.D. and Assistant Professor of Sociology and International Studies, will present the first Great Minds Lecture for the 2015-16 academic year on Thursday, Nov. 12, at 5:30 p.m. in the Fielding S. Russell Union, room 2048.
Flynn will present his work on the problem of accessing high-priced medicines to the Georgia Southern University and Statesboro communities in a lecture entitled, “The Dilemma of High-Priced Medicines.”
This talk highlights problems associated with accessing high-priced medicines in the United States and elsewhere and reviews some of the policies, actions, and proposals other countries and activists have used and suggested for ensuring that people who need life-saving and sickness-relieving medicines obtain them. The presentation will include a review of the drivers of costs, myths of research and development, and international agreements underpinning global pharmaceutical markets.
Flynn has researched this topic mainly from the perspective of the developing world but has also followed events in the United States and Europe. His recent book publication Pharmaceutical Autonomy and Public Health in Latin America: State, Society and Industry in Brazil’s AIDS Program (2015) looked at Brazil’s struggle to provide high-priced AIDS medicines for free to its entire seropositive population. Here is a description of the book:
Brazil has occupied a central role in the access to medicines movement, especially with respect to drugs used to treat those with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes the acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). How and why Brazil succeeded in overcoming powerful political and economic interests, both at home and abroad, to roll-out and sustain treatment represents an intellectual puzzle.
In this book, Matthew Flynn traces the numerous challenges Brazil faced in its efforts to provide essential medicines to all of its citizens. Using dependency theory, state theory, and human rights discourse, Flynn delves deeper into the salient factors contributing to Brazil’s successes and weaknesses, including control over technology, creation of political alliances, and instrumental use of normative frameworks and effectively explains the ability of countries to fulfill the prescription drug needs of its population versus the interests and operations of the global pharmaceutical industry.
Pharmaceutical Autonomy and Public Health in Latin America is one of the only books to provide an in-depth account of the challenges that a developing country, like Brazil, faces to fulfill public health objectives amidst increasing global economic integration and new international trade agreements. Scholars interested in public health issues, HIV/AIDS, and human rights, but also to social scientists interested in Latin America and international political economy will find this an original and thought provoking read.
About Matthew Flynn
Matthew Flynn is an Assistant Professor of International Studies and Sociology. His research focuses on political economy, globalization, and human rights. He has authored several articles focused on Latin America including a recent book publication Pharmaceutical Autonomy and Public Health in Latin America: State, Society, and Industry in Brazil’s AIDS Program (Routledge 2015). His current research is examining the immigration detention complex. In the past, he has worked as a consultant for the Pan American Health Organization and Texas’s Department of State Health Services, and as a foreign correspondent in Brazil. He received his Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin in December 2010. Dr. Flynn received his Masters in Sociology from the London School of Economics and Social Science (London, UK) and holds a B.S. in Foreign Service from Georgetown University (Washington, DC).
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