By Rebecca Limb and Liz James On 1st December 2020, the Tavistock judgment was published. The legal issue concerning the court was identifying the circumstances where a child, under the age of 18 diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria (GD), is competent to give valid consent to the administration of puberty blockers (PB). The judgment has made […]
Month: December 2020
“Healthcare heroes”: The danger of military metaphors
By Zahra H. Khan, Yoshiko Iwai, Sayantani DasGupta Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the “Healthcare Hero” metaphor has gained tremendous popularity, generating praise for healthcare workers as well as caution against the metaphor’s potentially negative consequences. In her recent article, Dr. Caitríona L Cox explains that, when heroized, healthcare workers face unfair expectations of personal sacrifice […]
Vulnerable adults can be autonomous. Assuming that they are not is wrong and harmful.
By Jonathan Lewis. With the establishment of the Mental Capacity Act (“MCA”) 2005 in England and Wales, the days of court interventions into the lives of adults with mental capacity seemed numbered. If you were an adult with capacity, then you were legally recognised as able to give genuine consent to care and medical treatments. […]
Using moral case deliberation as an analysis tool for exploring decision-making around admission to intensive care, in research before and during COVID-19
By Mia Svantesson, Bert Molewijk and Anne-Marie Slowther This raises the question of what is or should be established good practice in this decision-making process, which is often complex, grounded in uncertainty, and taking place in a time pressured environment. It is important that in the heat of a pandemic we do not lose sight […]
Are prolifers hypocritical?
By Bruce P. Blackshaw. There has been a swathe of academic papers in recent years accusing opponents of abortion (described as ‘prolife’) of hypocrisy. It’s a popular theme outside academia as well. The argument goes along the lines of ‘if prolifers care so much about fetuses, why don’t they do something about X’, where X […]
Is it okay to abort just one of the twin fetuses?
By Joona Räsänen Many people believe abortion is morally permissible. Yet many of the same people also believe that if the woman is pregnant with healthy twins, it is morally wrong for her to abort only one of the fetuses. But since we should choose morally permissible acts instead of impermissible ones, it implies that […]
Prize, Not a Price: How the right reward could solve the problem of kidney failure
By Aksel Braanen Sterri. Worldwide 1.2 million people are dying from kidney failure each year. The best treatment for kidney failure is a kidney transplant from a living donor, but too few people are willing to donate. In the paper, Prize, Not a Price: Reframing Rewards for Kidney Donors, I defend a way to meet […]
Is vaccine nationalism an obstacle or an obligation?
By Kyle Ferguson and Arthur Caplan. The pandemic has given us a new addition to our vocabulary: the phrase “vaccine nationalism.” It is rhetorically powerful. Political figures, journalists, and scholars have rapidly taken up and used the phrase. And even though it is vague enough to allow users to project different meanings upon it, “vaccine […]
“We think you may be at risk of a genetic disease”. Should direct-to-consumer genetic testing companies contact at-risk relatives?
By Philip E Baker and Jordan A Parsons. Direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing is becoming increasingly popular. However, with genetic testing comes the possibility of discovering mutations that confer increased risk of genetic diseases not only to the tested individual (the proband), but also their genetic relatives. This raises the challenging ethical question of what should […]
Close Eneph? SARS-CoV-2 challenge studies and altruistic kidney donation
By Hayden P. Nix and Charles Weijer. Human challenge studies are clinical trials in which researchers intentionally infect research participants with a pathogen. The UK government has announced plans to conduct SARS-CoV-2 challenge studies beginning in January 2021. SARS-CoV-2 human challenge studies are controversial because of the risks they pose to participants. In order to […]