Jennifer Cohen and Awele Utomi
Keywords: Bioethics, Nigeria, Lagos, HBCU, Howard University, Scholarship, Clinical Trials, Growing, Family, School, Columbia, Background, Research, Medical Schools, Pharmaceuticals, Access to Healthcare, Database, Data Sharing, Protests, Health Disparity
Jennifer Cohen 0:04
Welcome to the Voices in Bioethics podcast. I’m Jennifer Cohen. And it’s my pleasure today to interview Awele Michael Utomi, a student in the Masters of Bioethics program here at Columbia University. Awele, welcome to the podcast.
Awele Utomi 0:16
Hi, Jennifer, thank you for having me.
Jennifer Cohen 0:18
My pleasure. Awele, you have a fascinating background in healthcare and biotech research. But before we get to that, I’m hoping you can tell us about your personal background. You were born and grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, correct?
Awele Utomi 0:30
Yes, that’s correct.
Jennifer Cohen 0:31
And can you tell us a little bit about your childhood and growing up there, and how you decided to leave and come to America to study.
Awele Utomi 0:41
Of course. And that’s like a very interesting story for me personally. Especially now, actually, preparing for medical school interviews is something that comes up more often than not. And I would say that, to me, like that vision kind of started from my environment growing up in Lagos, and my own personal family struggles. So, I’ll first start with a personal. My mom actually suffered from Ankylosing Spondylitis when we’re younger, my dad also had hypertension. So my family had his own show of health issues that made it imperative for us to, you know, spend time in hospital with doctors, much more often than most of the people that, you know, in my background, you know, would spend. From I mean, my background middle class, middle class family, you know, my dad, and my mom would have master’s degrees, but they both wanted business. And for me, growing up in Lagos, Nigeria, meant that you were exposed to all of the realities of the situation, right. So I can say that I was left with better in a little way, like, a little more prepared, instead of my, that, you know, there was I could go to school, for myself and my, my three other siblings to school that there was still always, you know, that stroke, you know, I know, for me, I remember that distinctly. Because those issues were like, huge stories, or huge, like, issues that we had to really like, you know, go through and really define most of my childhood. And, you know, and it kind of got, like a more personal interaction with medicine, I would science as a young boy growing up, and like, I would always wonder, you know, because for me, my mother didn’t get diagnosed with that condition until I actually was in my first year of college. So like, we had known that there was an issue because she wouldn’t mobile, she wouldn’t be able to move, and everyone who had to chip into, you know, to help her with that. So for me, it kind of started that fascination. Okay, how is happen? Like, why can they find something for it, like, what’s new, what’s missing? And, you know, and for me, even though that in school, and you know, a home, I didn’t really have any scientists in my personal, in my circle, in my family, those questions kept on coming up with my dad, my mom, and even around me, because I would see that many people that I knew growing up, didn’t never see a doctor, they would go to pharmacists to get you know, drugs, you know, self-medication, whenever, you know, they needed to feel better, it was definitely hard for people that I knew to like, go to the doctor because like that was seen as very expensive. There were very few governmental sensitive few ones that were there had long lines, no long wait periods. So I got very accustomed to, you know, to waiting those lines, even like, you know, looking for fundraisers, looking for money for my family to you know, to find, you know, these things that, you know, we’re talking about. And that’s kind of like my introduction to that, you know, from my own personal environment, from going to school, seeing those disparities and inequities that kind of defined who got access to healthcare. And it kind of set me off on this journey, because I knew I want to do research. And I knew I wanted to do medicine, I noticed bring those two together, because like, I feel like for myself and my back on the discount this gap between the African like in the traditional methods, and of course, like the Western method, and we haven’t quite bridged that the way that we can see the Chinese have bridged that you know, with malaria, and you know, and the drugs that don’t know, like I mentioned that, you know, Chinese traditional medicine, with your western traditional ways of, you know, of clinical research, like, I feel like it’s important to find that synergy. So that’s kind of like the impetus for that. And even though I didn’t have that in high school, you know, I managed to convince my teachers to send me opportunities to notify scholarship exams, and, you know, all of that in my final year, and it was writing one of those exams that I was able to get a scholarship to study for the SAT/ACT, and eventually secure admissions to US. And that was all paid in scholarship, because my family couldn’t really do that. So for me, that was like a huge opportunity. I knew from there I go to Howard. And that’s kind of how, you know, I actually ended up in the US.
Jennifer Cohen 4:25
Such an inspiring story. So, as you say, you attended Howard University, which is one of this country’s premier research institutions, and an HBCU and historically black college and university. You spoke a little bit about your ability to get your teachers to help you and to have this dream come true. But how did you specifically decide on Howard as the place you wanted to study science and then eventually prepare yourself to apply to medical school?
Awele Utomi 4:54
Yes, that’s actually an interesting tale on its own because I actually did not decide on how. So it was actually the school that chose schools for our class, you know, best and brightest. And the school is called MBT training limited. And they were actually the ones that chose the schools based on, you know, the probability of getting scholarships that pass success rate with previous students. And you know, how it happened to be the one out of the four or five schools that they chose, for me that gave me full scholarship. So I actually introduced to it was that my friends and I, when we were on our way, because we all went to Howard, we went away to the US, we actually did not know that how it was in HBCU see you until, you know, we landed in Washington, DC. And it was a very interesting contradiction when we got to campus expecting the opposite of what we saw. And, of course, that’s supposed to not be one of the positions that I feel like I made because Howard definitely gave me the space and the environment to meet with us, you know, the DCV area, which is the DC, Metropolitan, DC, Maryland, Virginia area, also, you know, has a huge African committee. So it definitely made it easier for me to acclimate to do as I was like, you know.
Jennifer Cohen 5:59
So interesting. And how did you decide after Howard to come to Columbia?
Awele Utomi 6:06
Coming to Columbia was also very much a product of just my environment. I was in my final semester at Howard and I took a class called senior seminar class, which is like a required class for my biology degree. And in that class, we had an very amazing professor, Dr. Fatima Jackson, and we were talking about social justice, you know, there’s so many issues, and this was back then. And I feel like now it’s much more to the forefront, even then there was, you know, there was so many issues that we could see the wrong, you know, we talk about police brutality in the US, we talk about, you know, a number of you know, about black men and women, you know, and all just, you know, different kinds of things, and we were just talking about these things that were trying to say, okay, how do we in, you know, in the scientific world, you know, how do we advocate for this? Because, of course, you have your different ways, but like, it seems like, there wasn’t any field in medicine or in science do that. And that’s when she started talking to us about bioethics. And I was really intrigued in the field, because it seemed like, I should have known about the different before graduating, but it had took me that long of a time to find out about it. And, you know, from that class led on to, you know, find out about scholarships, you know, to support and Columbia HBC fellowship was new at the time, about two years old, and she sent me the link to to Jackson, you know, to apply for it, and some other programs. And, you know, I went to do questions in person, and that was how, you know, I came to, you know, to decide, and so I specifically look for programs that offer bioethics and that offered, you know, a funding for that, and Columbia HBCU fellowship was like, you know, one of the major ones, and I was really happy to be a graduate now, you know, finish with the program, and it’s an amazing fellowship, and I can’t recommend it even like more highly.
Jennifer Cohen 7:41
Oh, that’s wonderful. Yes. As you say, you’re an HBCU fellow, during the program, did you find that experience exciting? Or were there aspects of it, that surprised you being a fellow?
Awele Utomi 7:54
It was definitely like a huge learning curve. For me, it seemed that throughout the course of my educational journey, I’ve continued to, you know, to go to like, higher institutions, I remember, like, I went to a public school, for high school in Lagos, and I remember just how different it was for us, you know, compared to them, that went to private schools. And I definitely noticed in terms of like, the resources, you know, they have like practical classes for like science, knowing that your practical class might not have necessarily materials or, you know, I kind of grew up without this. And so like, for me, like, it’s kind of reinforced the idea that even just as I continue to go to these spaces, and and for me, like going to Columbia University was definitely huge change personally. I was in New York. So I was definitely a little bit, you know, estranged from my immediate, you know, family that built up in the US while I was at Howard. And even just like, you know, how Columbia is a huge school, you know, it’s one of the top schools. So for me, like, come in and look into how I look, I know coming from where I come from, that goes up a lot that gets us to have a calm, you know, that feeling of imposter syndrome. You know, reaching out to professor’s, feeling like you’re worthy to be in the classroom. And I felt like it was a huge learning curve. My fellowship helped a lot because like, you know, we had this immediate family, immediately getting into the fellowship and into university that okay, hey, like, this is 20 HBCUs, other fellows that you can call your family, you know, HBCUs all across the USA, he was definitely interested in mesh of people why, you know, and ideas and everyone is in New York, and this was really COVID-19, of course, so we, you have to adapt to all of that. So it was definitely a huge learning curve. For me. I like a lot to get to, but like, I wouldn’t trade it for like anything else.
Jennifer Cohen 9:30
Wonderful. Okay, let’s turn to your work as a researcher talking about your learning curve at Howard, you were inducted into Phi Beta Kappa, the most prestigious academic honor society. And that’s where you began your career as a researcher. Can you tell us a little bit about some of the projects you worked on while a student at Howard?
Awele Utomi 9:48
Yes, and I believe you’re referring specifically to a research project, right?
Jennifer Cohen 9:53
Yes.
Awele Utomi 9:54
Of course. Yes. So I was very much involved in research at Howard because you know, like, that was my whole reason for going to the US in first place. to try and get a more practical understanding of vicious projects to conduct that. And I already knew that I couldn’t get that a whole mass public to people back home, you know, even so the Metreon University of Lagos, which is where I was at, which is where I applied for medicine, and actually was accepted to before, or to give me a scholarship, and like, for me, like several of those things was important for me. So it makes like a go to Howard, you know, I mean, besides searching for things, and of course, it was hard being international students, I, you know, coming away from Nigeria, so it was, there was a lot that I had to do to, you know, like, prove to people that, you know, that was worth it. And, of course, Howard has given me a bunch of opportunities. I, my first lab was actually in a new biology lab with Dr. Mike Burke. And, you know, under him, we kind of looked at HIV infections, we use in monkeys as our test subjects in monkeys. It’s called SIV simian immunodeficiency virus, and, you know, we applied, you know, even the fluencey techniques, you know, we studied their brain cells, you know, and we bring tissues and we kind of, you know, looking for those markers or looking for those probes that we could use as indicators. And for me, like, that was also like a very, very big opportunity, like big an eye opening time for me, because I was learning how to commit scientists, taking the things I was learning from my favorite group work to you know, the practical world you know, learning new techniques, learn how to time manage, also, like, you know, human like just meet, interacting with, you know, with on the lab equipment and technology, because, of course, like, all these things are expensive. So, you know, even like any mistake he made is, you know, is always going to be expensive to the PI. But you know, I had a great understanding PI, sounds kind of efficient, looking to research. And it was big for me, I actually worked there for three years. And I also worked at a computational biology lab with Dr. Campbell. And under him, he had discovered this mass of metal to people in mutations of a new identified diseases, you know, and so I like it, that lab was my introduction to data science, I learned MATLAB, I attended a conference at MIT to kind of get up to date on that, and I was looking forward gender signatures of positive selection that were critical to human evolution. So we were comparing both human and chimpanzees, DNA to budget DNA supposed to be 95%, you know, close our close relation. And we’re looking for in order to change the signal or any specific data in the pathogenesis of disease like that, I know, we’re looking at Alzheimer’s, you know, and for me, like that was a huge thing, because I came from a very biological background. And even though like in my research up to that point, that all done wetlab data by first time looking at Python and our real, you know, and getting this knowledge of non digital health and like that would eventually, you know, drive my decision to, you know, to want to push for more clinical research, you know, in the future. And I was also able to, you know, to get internship at Princeton and Genentech during that time,
Jennifer Cohen 12:36
So fascinating. Now, while you were finishing the bioethics degree, you were also working in pharma, and Genentech, what type of work were you doing there?
Awele Utomi 12:42
Yes. And Genentech, I actually this my second stint. In my first time I go summer internship there, and I was in the developmental science departments, and I worked on the clinical pharmacology. And in that specific space, I looked at data sharing platforms, in the sense that you know, of course, all up to like now in the past few years, we’ve seen an increase in the pharma industry being more open to sharing information about clinical trials. And before then you’d have known different companies, you know, doing the same trials, you know, working on the same forms, but then not knowing about it, because they’re all siloed from each other. So now, there’s a more collaborative approach to do research and clinical research. I’ve seen that, you know, in COVID-19, this year with the opposite at Genentech, and the level of collaboration between pharmaceutical companies sharing information in real time, Preprints, you know, we’re seeing that increase and that’s kind of why I looked at. And this is an industry wide effort, instantly an industry wide effort, and it was called transliterate. And I worked on the placebo database specifically. So my database was comprised of different almost like 20, major pharmaceutical companies, I know we’re looking at big data, trying to get those historical data from clinical trial control labs. And the idea was that if we could get all of these control labs into this database in one senator base from different pharmaceutical companies, that will save costs eventually, because like, there’ll be no need to conduct actual placebo trials when you’re they have that data for whatever indication that you’re trying to look for. So it was usually collaborative, I was able to know to like to talk to different kinds of people, you know, to learn the kinds of things to you know, get more insight into the biotech world and clinical research.
Jennifer Cohen 14:16
Okay, let’s turn to your career as a bioethicist. You’ve spoken already about the struggles you faced and your family faced when you were growing up in Nigeria to get your parents health care and access to health care. What do you think your Nigerian perspective brings to your study of bioethics here in the US and in New York City? Specifically?
Awele Utomi 14:38
I think I was there by saying that bioethics is only as powerful as the different strands of thoughts that they allows, or culturally divergent viewpoints are they allowed to be included in his body of work. Because against bioethics very much is about the people is about morals, about the ethics of things, but I feel like even beyond that, like it’s really about how people interact and you know, and the rules and the regulations got into those interactions. And for me I, I really brought my own personal background to this because like, again, the only way to make things relevant to us to make them personal, to turn them for like a general to like a specific like, why is that important to you? And for me, I saw bioethics as a way to espouse a specific African ideas and ideals, and even more specifically like to bring to the forefront in terms of medical dealings back home, because, of course, it’s still very much in nascent fields, back home and Islamification, you know, going on right now increasing idea and increased awareness of the topic. So it was very much in even from that senior seminar class, I seen that there were not enough people and in a voice like me speaking in the field, you know, and specifically for our issues. Because again, you can only speak about the issue that you’re intimate about. And I think that having that personal connection to that was important to me, you know, for talking about, you know, clinical trials, talking about, you know, paternalism in medicine, informed consent, knowing like, how important is the family to die, because for us, I’m sure that many of the coaches are not been like special about that. But you know, the family is important, as opposed to the idea of personal autonomy, that question ethics kind of espouses. And of course, the individual will be important, but you know, just trying to manage those different ideas and like, express them in a way that I know that to be relevant to my community, my environment was kind of like my sick into all of this. And I was really able to explore this my time at Columbia and my thesis actually on African bioethics. And it was a huge body of work, and it felt like there’s a lot of like research to be done. So it’s not really like conclusive or like, definitive, you know, so it was interesting to see it you know, to get involved you know, from that, you know, side.
Jennifer Cohen 16:41
You say it’s a nascent field in, in African and Nigeria. A terrible ethics violation occurred in Nigeria, 1996, is when we study at Columbia, where a Pfizer clinical trial of an antibiotic used to treat pediatric meningitis resulted in the deaths of a number of children. And there were allegations of falsification of trial results and a failure to obtain informed consent. There were multiple lawsuits. Pfizer ended up paying a $75 million dollar settlement and there have been books and film made based on this scandal. Did that case, start to raise awareness around bioethical issues in Nigeria? Is bioethics something that’s taught in medical schools, if you know, in Nigeria?
Awele Utomi 17:22
So to my knowledge is definitely something that is taught. And I do think that in my research so far, that just based on the size of the country specifically, it has like a little bit more awareness of it, compared to other places where we’re seeing, you know, a lot of grants from here and to support people that stay there like to elect to and learn more about bioethics. And it was definitely taught in medical schools, because I have friends in medical schools that, you know, that told me about these things. But again, like, we still like an ongoing body of work to come up with our own frameworks, you know, to make it more personal towards the way that we’ve seen bioethics obligations in Asia, you know, kind of really dive deep into topic, I know, to merge those two, I guess, ideas and ideas and to make it relevant to us. I feel like there’s still a challenge in trying to understand how relevant it is to division, and even to how to govern, you know, like clinical trials and all of that, you know. So to talk about itself, like Nigeria, when it comes to clinical trials, we have a number of bodies that are responsible for not really unlike the IRB review boards in the US, we have like a number of boards that do that, but again, there’s still a lot of gaps in between, you know, how binding recommendations are, how strict they are, you know, like, and there’s no way they can sidestep that back on. So I do think that there is more awareness of it at this specifically Nigeria than everywhere else. No, I think so, and like other places to. Most of the places that clinical trials is usually done, but it’s still very much a field that is that’s new, in that sense.
Jennifer Cohen 18:44
Okay. Let’s turn to your commitment to social justice movements. As you’ve already discussed, you were aware of health disparities and social disparities growing up, and how this affected people’s health. There has been some tragic news from Nigeria recently, a number of young protesters were shot and killed in the streets of Lagos while protesting police brutality. And these protests have been going on for years against the division of the police called the special anti-robbery squad or SARS, which is a bizarre coincidence, given the name of the pandemic, but this police division has been accused of torture and abuse. And I believe, as a result of the protest, it’s just been disbanded. And there is now an official inquiry into the division. Can you give us some more detail about the nature and the goals of the protests? And were you in contact or aware of any of the protesters who were injured or tragically died?
Awele Utomi 19:46
Uh, yeah, like that, that entire happening is still very raw to me, as it’s not been… it’s only been a couple of weeks since that D Day when the Nigerian government you know, unleashed the military, and soldiers, and innocent protesters and you know the number of videos of that on Twitter. And for me, I think that I can only speak from my experience specifically because like I was here in the US when this was all happening not in the back home, but everyone else and against word and the diaspora, you know, connected, you know, social media to these happenings, and we saw, you know, all the videos, we saw the live cast of this whole, you know, issue I mean. So how it played out and, you know, all of the lies, you know, the different way that the media even painted it initially before, you know, starting to put pressure on the government. And it still very much a very sad and raw issue for me personally, because I like almost everyone else that has family there, you know, we were scared for them, we were hoping that it wouldn’t get volatile, because, you know, the entire, especially because like, it was all centrally located, specifically in Lagos, with protests happening all across the nation. And for us, like it was it was, if I’m not mistaken, the biggest protest movement we had for this in almost every state, and we’ve never had that level of recognition. And for me, despite all the negatives, I also know of, you know, people from high school that were missing up after the protest, and we couldn’t, you know, really reach out to them or know what it was, because we didn’t know which actually took them to. I mean, there was so much uncertainty in that time, everyone was scared, you have people that when they were home, you know, they were still you know, getting arrested, you know, and people took advantage of that volatility, to like to cause panic to lose. So like, there’s a lot, a lot of sadness, you know, anger just going on at that time. But it definitely started the process was like, I feel like with an artist, right now, I’ve seen just the resilience that they have shown in that time, you know, something that I never thought possible growing up. There’s much more awareness. And right now, like the initial goals were they had, you know, a list of demands that’s, they had for the government, including them in the solution of size, you know, verification of the officers, a citizens kind of body to investigate all the abuses, and those like ensuring that the soldiers that committed crimes, like the specific ones that you had named for that, you know, they were brought to justice. So they were the one number or required reporters was kind of aim that. And initially, we saw that that kind of, again, consistent the first time this issue has been going on for a minute, it’s been going on for the past three, four years. And its only reached accent now, because with Nigerian government saying when in 2018 that, you know, they would cancel size and you know, they had this announcement that they were not really able to make certain things. So it is right now, we’re saying that there will be probably more protests. But we’ll see now that we can do that, that we can organize and hold our elected leaders, you know, to account but there’s still a lot of work to be done in the organization in the support. And that’s why I believe that even for our Americanized approach to bioethics we have, I know that there was no articles on our website about that. And that’s why I’m sharing the links on how to support the protests, all of that, because it’s still very much an issue that affects everyone, you know, despite the fact that it’s only, you know, we naturally simulate police brutality and the US and affect the entire world. So it’s that interest anyways, you know, it’s something that we all should be concerned about. And it’s terrible to see the impunity that the government has kind of, you know, like innocent protests. So we won’t see how that goes. But I’m, I’m very optimistic that this is like, you know, a new dawn. For us. Nigeria, to very much a youth country is most 60 percent of young people. So it’s very much a time for us. And yet, we’re being represented by very old leaders that lead in our military regime, like years ago. So it’s, it’s very much a time that was seen that we need to take our country into our own hands. And like, I’m very proud of my peers, you know, back home and our support in different ways and like, sharing awareness. And you can see that everyone is very, very committed about, it’s very passionate about it. So definitely pause to take despite the negativity and the tension that is happening.
Jennifer Cohen 23:33
Thank you for that perspective. So let me turn now to the pandemic and its effects in Nigeria, there have been a little over 1000 deaths in Nigeria as a result of COVID. And Nigeria is a country with a population of nearly 200 million people. So that seems like the country has done a good job containing the virus. How would you say the pandemic has affected Nigeria?
Awele Utomi 23:57
I would say very much like the rest of the world severely. I do think that yes, from a numbers standpoint, we have done a good job of that. And I think the entire West African region, just based from the Ebola epidemic, a few years ago, you know, they have, you know, the systems in place, and, you know, coming from that deadly time, so I do think that they were a little more prepared than many news reports, I, you know, and even myself, you know, give them credit for taking the lessons from the epidemic. But I will say that in terms of like the economic situation that, you know, it’s terrible. And we can say that, literally in a number of ways. And of course, along with the protests has increased prices. We’ve seen people laid off because they can’t go to work. And not everyone can work from home. There’s a number of issues I’ve seen, even like with children and school closures and like not being able to have the support, like I would have here, maybe going to Columbia or anywhere else not to be able to attend school from home not only based on your kind of school, like you know, and the money that it has, the class, it’s actually like a huge class gap in how this has affected you and I kind of like pushed people closer to the brink. But in terms of numbers, I do think that there has been a good job of that. But then again, that can be explained by maybe not as much testing as the US or some of the other countries has done. But like, I don’t think that we can take that away because like if it was bad in terms of numbers, that we would know that but it definitely not been… We’ll see now the number of things speaking about opening, reopening that are like churches reopened, you know, you have smackers opened and of course in schools already start to reopen. There’s definitely a bit of those in news on that point compared to the rest of the world at this time.
Jennifer Cohen 25:32
And my last question Awele, they were do you see yourself making the biggest impact as a bioethicist?
Awele Utomi 25:39
I think where can make the biggest impact as bioethicist is exploring that space between medicine, and bioethics, and, of course, social justice. And I mean, to the sense that like, even beyond raising awareness of bioethics and social issues, I mean, essentially, of empowering our people to get more involved, you know, in the field and more involved, you know, in speaking up and in documenting these things, and creating new ways of thought, you know, the paradigms and balanced ways of thinking that you really support and you know, to bring it to a close. But for me, I think I can make the biggest impact as bioethics by exploring that speculative and clinical research, in medicine and bioethics. But especially in the local context, like I’ve said, and of course, right now, at Genentech, we’re looking at issues of last mile problems, trying to figure out how COVID has impacted cases and also affected, you know, people’s availability to vaccines and drugs, you know, and of course, a major issue has been increasing our manufacturing outputs of the facilities are motivation. So like, for me, that’s kind of where I see myself making a huge impact in emerging my own background, you know, you know, the competition and the digital healthcare, which I think is one of the major trends in personalized medicine, and bring that whole way of thinking, you know, to the region, because I do think that there is the opportunity to grow my awareness of it, which creates more initiatives, you know, and kind of solidify what it means for us and how to affect the different verses that we do. So there’s definitely a lot of space, I think, for that. And I guess being a huge part of whatever you’re doing in terms of like trying to alleviate and reduce that gap in healthcare.
Jennifer Cohen 27:14
Awele Utomi, thank you for sharing your fascinating background with us and best of luck in the future.
Awele Utomi 27:21
Thank you. Thanks. Thanks for having me.