Project Title: Comparing Cost, Coverage and Access to Pharmaceuticals under Australian and U.S. Policy Frameworks

Mentors: Sara Rosenbaum, J.D., Marilyn Moon, Ph.D., and Bruce Stuart, Ph.D.

Placement: Department of Health Policy, School of Public Health & Health Services, George Washington University

Ruth Lopert, a 2006–07 Commonwealth Fund Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy, is a public health physician and pharmacoepidemiologist, and is currently principal adviser in the Pharmaceutical Policy Taskforce in the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing in Canberra, Australia. Prior to the establishment of the Taskforce in 2005 Lopert held the position of senior medical adviser in the Pharmaceutical Benefits Branch of the Department, providing clinical and policy advice in relation to the operation of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) and acting as an adviser to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC). Previously Lopert was a senior lecturer in the Department of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Newcastle, NSW where she was involved in the clinical and economic evaluation of new drugs proposed for listing on the Australian PBS. She is a member of the WHO Expert Advisory Panel on Drug Policies and Management, and was the primary negotiator of the pharmaceutical provisions of the Australia United States Free Trade Agreement. Lopert has published and presented internationally in pharmacoeconomics and has particular interests in pharmaceutical policy, pharmaceutical IP, drug pricing and access to medicines.

E-mail: ruth.lopert@health.gov.au

Publications

Lopert, R., Rosenbaum, S. "What is Fair? Choice, fairness and transparency in access to prescription medicines in the United States and Australia," Journal of Law Medicine and Ethics, Winter 2007; 35(4): 643–656.