Guest Post by Phoebe Friesen Re: Personal responsibility within health policy: unethical and ineffective If someone who has smoked two packs a day for thirty years and someone who has never smoked but is unfortunate enough to inherit a genetic condition are both in need of heart surgery, who should be given priority? Should an […]
Month: September 2016
Our Special Treatment of Patients in a Vegetative State is a Form of Cruel and Unusual Punishment
by Professor Dominic Wilkinson, @Neonatalethics Professor of Medical Ethics, Consultant Neonatologist Our society has good reason to provide special treatment to people with severe brain injuries and their families. But our current “special treatment” for a group of the most severely affected people with brain injuries leads to devastating, agonising, protracted and totally preventable suffering. […]
Should Junior Doctors Still Strike?
Guest Post by Adam James Roberts In early July, the British Medical Association’s junior members voted by a 16-point margin to reject a new employment contract negotiated between the BMA’s leadership and the Government. The chair of the BMA’s junior doctors committee, Johann Malawana, stood down following the result, noting the “considerable anger and mistrust” […]
Is it Ethical to Pay Adolescents to Take HIV Treatment?
Guest Post by Rebecca Hope, Nir Eyal, Justin Healy & Jacqueline Bhabha Re: Paying for antiretroviral adherence: is it unethical when the patient is an adolescent? With treatment, a child with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa can expect to live a healthy life. Better access to HIV treatment is contributing to a global decline in HIV deaths […]
Letter from Iraq: Ethical Dilemmas in an Iraqi Burn Centre
Guest Post by Mustafa AL-Shamsi Health requires a multidisciplinary approach. In the absence of proper support, facilities and literate people, there is little that a physician can do to cure his patient regardless his proficiency. The following is not a story; it comes from what I experienced when I was an intern at the burn […]
Sharing Motherhood and Patriarchal Prejudices
Guest Post by Ezio Di Nucci, University of Copenhagen Re: IVF, Same Sex Couples and the Value of Biological Ties Reproductive technologies are increasingly enabling access to parenthood to people who previously could not procreate: these developments are changing concepts and practices within family relationships in interesting ways. Take the following example: in a particular form […]