By Shane Ryan What’s the point of academic research? An obvious answer is to advance knowledge and understanding in our various subject areas. Indeed, when peer reviewers judge that manuscripts submitted to journals do this, then often they recommend that those manuscripts be published. That a central goal of research is to advance knowledge and […]
Latest articles
Why journal editors should stop policing authorship
By Udo Schuklenk Brian Earp and colleagues invited commentaries on authorship and generative AI. They offer us some good reasons for why generative AI will be forcing us to disaggregate authorship, and also for the view that we may need different authorship criteria for different outputs. Perhaps they are right. My commentary goes in a […]
Can safeguards make psychiatric coercion harder to end?
By Katarzyna Widlas-Klimsiak The Council of Europe (CoE) is pursuing two different ways of protecting people who receive mental healthcare without their consent. A draft Additional Protocol to the Oviedo Convention would create binding obligations for states that ratify it. A new, non-binding Recommendation puts autonomy, consent and the prevention of coercion at the centre. The […]
Between doing everything or letting go: Time-limited trials in the ICU
By Chih-Wei Ten and Daniel Fu-Chang Tsai He was young and healthy only days earlier. Then fulminant myocarditis led to cardiac arrest, prolonged resuscitation, and mechanical ventilation in the ICU. Circulation returned, but the neurological signs were grim. Seizures persisted. Brainstem reflexes weakened. Days passed with no meaningful neurological recovery. The family faced a question […]
Whose permission counts? Rethinking abortion access through the lens of authorization
By Shizuko Takahashi A law permits abortion. A court has ruled, or a legislature has voted. Legality appears settled. But for the pregnant person in front of a clinician, legality is often not enough. Someone still has to authorize the abortion in practice. This is the starting point of the second instalment of the Global […]
A right that exists only as a billing rule is not yet a right
By George Kujo, Kazuya Iwai and Shunsuke Takagi Suppose a hospital lets you sit with your dying mother only because, if it refuses, it loses a payment. Has it honoured her right to your company — or merely met a condition on its invoice? This is not a thought experiment. It is, in effect, the […]
Ethics’ forgotten hero – Maurice Pappworth
By Rafael Escandon Every June, I reflect on how Henry Knowles Beecher must have felt – 60 years ago – in the days before his classic, Ethics and Clinical Research (E&CR) was published. From my first reading of it, I thought Beecher’s effort was remarkably brave and have considered him a personal hero ever since. […]
When genetic testing matters beyond treatment: why not all personal utility is equal
By Dr Johnny Sakr Genetic testing is often assessed by asking a familiar question: does it change clinical management? If the answer is yes, the value of the test is relatively easy to explain. It may guide treatment, avoid unnecessary investigations, or improve health outcomes. But many genomic tests produce information that families value even […]
What values should a suicide prevention scheme express?
By Tessa Jane Holzman On 24 June 2025, the Australian Productivity Commission released an interim report evaluating the National Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Agreement. This report paints a scathing picture of the state of the Agreement. While the PC’s recommendations are certainly important components of a robust national strategy for mental health and suicide […]
Still relying on Thomson and Rachels? Read this first
By Matti Häyry Judith Jarvis Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion” (1971) and James Rachels’s “Active and Passive Euthanasia” (1975) are still the gold standard for philosophical argument in medical ethics, five decades after they were published. This is horrible. Academic folklore has it that they both advocate reasonably moderate, even permissive views on abortion and […]