accessibsa is a tri-continental project enabled by a fellowship from the Shuttleworth Foundation. Our work expands access to life-saving medicines and vaccines for those most in need.

As a strict rule, we do not accept money or support from the pharmaceutical industry, including generic manufacturers, directly or indirectly, in any form whatsoever.

To get in touch, email us at info /@/ accessibsa /dot/ org OR aprabhala /@/ gmail /dot/ com

Professor Feroz Ali is the Department of Industry Policy and Promotion (DIPP), Ministry of Commerce and Industry Chair on Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras. He is also a practicing advocate at the Madras High Court.

Vânia Alves is a journalist with over 20 years of experience. For the last 10 years, she has been working for Non-Governmental Organizations as a communications coordinator, interim communications director, and press officer. She is highly skilled in developing and implementing communications strategies, managing teams and working across different departments to ensure messages and priorities are aligned. As the Greenpeace International Amazon Campaign Communications Coordinator, she played a key role in the successful campaign to stall the process of building the São Luiz do Tapajós mega dam in the Amazon, working especially with international media. As the interim communications director with MSF, she built strong visibility and reputation for the organization in Brazil and fostered engagement with the public via different communications channels.

Jonathan Berger is an advocate of the High Court of South Africa and a member of the Johannesburg Bar. After serving as the legal education and advice officer at the National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality from 1997 to 1999, he clerked for Justice O’Regan of the Constitutional Court of South Africa.

Jonathan also served as a senior researcher and head of policy and research at South Africa’s SECTION27 (formerly known as the AIDS Law Project) from January 2002 to December 2011.  He holds degrees in architecture and law from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, as well as a master’s degree in law from the University of Toronto. From June 2009 to December 2011, Jonathan was a member of South Africa’s Medicines Control Council, and chaired its expert legal committee. He currently serves on the board of directors of Health-E News Service, a not-for-profit South African media company, and on the Expert Advisory Group of the Geneva-based Medicines Patent Pool.

Gabriela Costa Chaves is a pharmacist, who went on to do a Master’s Degree and subsequently a PhD in public health at the Department of Medicines Policy and Pharmaceutical Services (NAF), Sergio Arouca National School of Public Health (ENSP), Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz). Gabriela has 15 years of experience in the field of intellectual property rights and access to medicines.

Roberta Dorneles Ferreira da Costa is a pharmacist from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (2012). She has a Master’s Degree in Public Health from the University of State of Rio de Janeiro, in which she evaluated the federal purchases of medicines for Alzheimer’s disease. She is a PhD candidate at the same institution, focusing on the relationship between medicines and the market in society. She has been developing research in the field of pharmaceutical services, economics of medicines, industrial pharmaceutical policy, and intellectual property rights.

Vivek is a lawyer who has worked for two decades on the intersections of health, law and human rights in India and internationally. He managed Lawyers Collective HIV/AIDS Unit in India from 2000-07 where he developed the work on intellectual property and access to medicines. He was at UNDP in the HIV, Health and Development Group from 2009-14, where his tasks included working at the Secretariat of the Global Commission on HIV & the Law (hivlawcommission.org). He is a founder of the Health, Equity and Law Project.

Walter Britto Gaspar graduated in law from the Getulio Vargas Foundation, and is a candidate for a Master’s Degree in Public Health at the Social Medicine Institute at the Rio de Janeiro State University. He is a former coordinator of Universities Allied for Essential Medicines in Brazil, and the co-author of the book “O que é Creative Commons? Novos modelos de direitos autorais em um mundo mais criativo” (2013), the first investgation in the country to cover the subject of Creative Commons licenses under Brazilian law.

Dr. Jayadev is an Associate Professor of Economics at the School of Liberal Studies at Azim Premji University (APU), Bangalore. He has also worked as an Associate Professor of Economics at University of Massachusetts (UMass), Boston, USA (2005-2017), as a Fellow at Roosevelt Institute, New York, USA (2009-2011), & as the visiting research Fellow at the Columbia University Committee on Global Thought, New York, USA (2007-2009). He holds a B.A. in Economics & Management from University of London, London & completed his Ph.D. in Economics from University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA.

His research interests are economics & development, with focus across multiple areas such as, macroeconomics (especially issues of debt, balance sheets, the political economy of finance and central banking and macroeconomic policy choices), income distribution and inequality (classical approaches to distribution, and group based inequalities), intellectual property, and the economics of power. He has also been closely involved with the CORE economics project (Curriculum Open-Access Resources for Economics), which is a group of scholars engaged in the production of high-quality resources for the teaching of economics, distributed free of charge worldwide under a Creative Commons license. At CORE, he has developed its first unit, ‘The Capitalist Revolution’, with Samuel Bowles and Wendy Carlin. Dr. Jayadev is also the co-editor of ‘The Journal of Globalization and Development’ since 2013 & works closely as a consultant with Institute of New Economic Thinking, New York, USA. He has been awarded the Solomon Barkin Award for Excellence in Research (UMass Amherst, 2003), the  inaugural John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Excellence in Research from the UMass Amherst’s Department of Economics (2005). He also won the IEDRA ExIm Bank Award for Best Dissertation (2008).

Roshan is a lawyer and researcher working on Intellectual Property. His work currently focusses on patent laws. He is broadly interested in studying and analyzing the law and policy aspects of IP, science, and technology through a developmental perspective. He holds a Master’s degree in Law, specialising in IP.

A seasoned professional, Chatura has spent several years in strategising, planning and managing Content and Communications across several industries. Since 2010 she has been an independent consultant, working specifically with start-ups, not-for-profits, and small organisations in the area of communications. Her experience ranges across diverse brands such as: TIDE Learning, ennovent, CRY, GoSports Foundation, Tour of Nilgiris, Bengaluru Bulls, Sattva Consulting etc. More on her profile here – Chatura Padaki

Pedro Paranaguá was, until recently, the Lead Advisor to the Workers Party at the Brazilian House of Representatives for Internet, copyright, patent, data privacy, cybercrime, and related matters. He was responsible for drafting the Brazilian Internet Framework Bill (“Marco Civil”) for the rapporteur, Rep. Alessandro Molon, including provisions on net neutrality, ISP liability, and privacy. He coordinated the 350-page report, “Brazil’s Patent Reform,” for the Brazilian House of Representatives.

Mr. Paranaguá is a Lecturer in Law at the LL.M. in Business Law at Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV), Brazil, since 2007.

He has been an invited instructor at Duke University School of Law (2011), lecturer in law at FGV Rio, and has held numerous other lectureships in Brazil and abroad (Harvard, Yale, UCLA, UNESCO, UNCTAD, WIPO, Brazil’s Supreme Court and Senate). He was Program Manager of the A2K Brazil Program at the Center for Technology and Society (CTS-FGV), and co-representative of Creative Commons in Brazil (2005-2010). He produced commissioned studies on copyright and technology for the country’s Culture Ministry, and served as FGV-delegate at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in Geneva (2005-2009). He is also a member of the Brazilian Free Software Project. He was a Project Manager on patents and access to medicines, with a scholarship from Doctors Without Borders (MSF) (2003-2004). From 2001 to 2003, he was an IP lawyer at Gusmão & Labrunie.

He is the author of the books Copyright Law (Portuguese) (w/ Sergio Branco) and Patent Law (Portuguese) (w/ Renata Reis). Blogged from Iran during the 2009 elections: http://viafoco.wordpress.com Amateur photographer. Has drawn his eco-friendly house and dimentioned its sustainable technologies, including photovoltaic solar panels, reuse of 100% of the water, drip irrigation for 700 trees that he has planted, as well as a small agroforest.

Mr. Paranaguá holds a Doctoral degree (S.J.D.) (Duke), with the thesis “Brazil’s Copyright Law Revision: Tropicália 3.0?”, under the supervision of Prof. Jerome Reichman, and Board Members James Boyle, Laurence Helfer, David Lange & Ruth Odekiji, and a LL.M. (cum laude) (London).

C.Prabhu is a lawyer based in Chennai, with an interest in Administrative and Intellectual Property Laws. He graduated from Delhi University with a B.A.Geography (Hons.) and an LL.B. He is currently working on administrative issues between citizens and public authorities in relation to the Right to Information Act (RTI) across the state of Tamil Nadu.

Sudarsan is a patent analyst based in London. A biologist looking to expand his lexicon, he divides his time grappling with both scientific jargon and legalese found in patents. Equipped with the capacity to understand both, he works at the interface, helping study the impact of patents on public health across the world.

Venkat’s love for technologies and his passion for helping research products to enter the market place, helped him transition from bench work to IP side. A Chemist and researcher at heart with Ph.D from Tufts University, worked as a Patent Analyst for an IP firm, analyzed PCT patent applications for USPTO. He is learning Indian Patent law, looking forward to searching/analyzing/drafting Indian patents and eventually help in creating IP awareness to all

James Tiburcio is a researcher and translator between São Paulo and Bangalore. He works on Public Policy and its application to Food Security in Brazil and India. Tiburcio has been a visiting researcher at Azim Premji University, and has worked with several non-profit organizations as a consultant. He has worked as a free-lance translator since 2001.

Mariani Nunes Sadock Vianna studies Pharmacy at the Fluminense Federal University (UFF). She is an intern at the Department of Medicines Policy and Pharmaceutical Services (NAF) at ENSP/Fiocruz and has been involved in research projects in the field of pharmaceutical services, health economics, industrial pharmaceutical policies and Intellectual property rights since 2016.

Marcela Fogaça Vieira is a lawyer and researcher working on human rights and access to medicines since 2005. She is an expert on intellectual property law and holds a master’s degree in public health. She has been working extensively on developing legal and advocacy strategies to improve access to treatment in light of international IP law in Brazil and has been an active part of the global access to medicines movement.