Humanising Healthcare podcast - 'Fake Medicines'

Listen to the podcast on Spotify: Fake Medicines

In this edition:

In this episode, Fake Medicines, Dr Manasi Nandi is joined by Dr Godwin Aleku and Dr Bahijja Raimi-Abraham. They share an insight into their careers and research, discuss the differences between falsified, substandard and counterfeit medicines, and broader problems that Fake Medicine can cause for global medicine.

Dr Bahijja Raimi-Abraham

Senior Lecturer in Pharmaceutics

Dr Bahijja Raimi-Abraham is pharmacist, Senior Lecturer in Pharmaceutics at King’s College London, Founder and Academic Lead of King’s College London Fight the Fakes and Pharmacy Working Group Lead for the African Diaspora Malaria Initiative. She leads her research group 'The Raimi-Abraham Group' where her primary research focus is on addressing pharmaceutical challenges in infectious diseases.

Dr Raimi-Abraham is passionate about promoting pharmacy and pharmaceutical sciences to the public and wider communities for example working with BBC News Africa on their campaign to raise awareness on the impact of fake medicines in Africa “How can you tell the difference between real and fake medicines? ”, “Spotting fake medicines with your mobile phone”, “ BBC News – People Fixing the World” (produced by Hannah Gelbart), invited to contribute to the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) Wise (Women in Science and Education) Words with a focus on the theme Women Shaping Pharmaceutical Sciences series and as a consultant the 'Go and No-go pills' Somerset House 24/7 exhibition, visited by ~35,000 people (October 2019 – February 2020). Dr Raimi-Abraham is also actively involved in a number of outreach activities, such as giving presentations at schools.

Dr Godwin Aleku

Lecturer in Drug Discovery

Dr Godwin Aleku is a Lecturer in Drug Discovery within the School of Cancer and Pharmaceutical Sciences at King's College London. He worked initially as a clinical pharmacist with focus on infectious diseases and later as a senior regulatory affairs officer with the (Nigerian) National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control. He moved to the UK as a postgraduate student and completed an MSc in Biotechnology and Enterprise in 2013 at the University of Exeter.

Joining King's College in November 2022; he leads an interdisciplinary research focusing on the development of clean enzyme-based sustainable pharmaceutical synthesis methods and the application of biocatalysis in drug discovery. His research employs multidisciplinary techniques including biocatalysis, organic synthesis, pharmacological screening, enzyme engineering, biochemistry, molecular biology, high-throughput assay development and industrial biotechnology.

Manasi Nandi

Reader in Integrative Pharmacology

Manasi is a scientist and educator based within the Faculty of Life Sciences and Medicine. Her interdisciplinary research focuses on the extraction of new information from vital signs data, aiding research and clinical decision making, and identifying earlier alerts of disease. She has expertise in medicine discovery and development and the translation of laboratory findings into clinical practice. She is a fellow of the British Pharmacological Society, most recently supporting efforts to embed inclusive principles into the national curriculum. Inclusivity and accessibility are at the core of her teaching and research practice. She is the Development, Diversity and Inclusion lead for the School and Cancer and Pharmaceutical Science, supporting EDI activities at Faculty and College level. She launched the Humanising Healthcare seminar series in 2023.