Event: Public Meeting of the President’s Council on Bioethics

October 31, 2008

Public Meeting of the President’s Council on Bioethics

SUMMARY: The President’s Council on Bioethics (Edmund D. Pellegrino, MD, Chairman) will hold its thirty-fifth meeting, at which it will discuss three topics: exercises of conscience in the practice of the health professions, the problem of medical futility, and the future of public bioethics and national bioethics commissions in the United States. Subjects discussed at past Council meetings (although not on the agenda for the November 2008 meeting) include: therapeutic and reproductive cloning, assisted reproduction, reproductive genetics, neuroscience, aging retardation, organ transplantation, personalized medicine, standards for the determination of death, children and bioethics, and lifespan-extension among others. 

DATES: The meeting will take place Thursday, November 20, 2008, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., ET; and Friday, November 21, 2008, from 9 a.m. to noon, ET.

ADDRESSES: Hotel Palomar Arlington, 1121 North 19th Street, Arlington, VA 22209. Phone 703-351-9170.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ms. Diane M. Gianelli, Director of Communications, The President’s Council on Bioethics, 1425 New York Avenue, NW., Suite C100, Washington, DC 20005. Telephone: 202/296-4669. E-mail: info@bioethics.gov. Web site: www.bioethics.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The meeting agenda will be posted at www.bioethics.gov. The Council encourages public input, either in person or in writing. At this meeting, interested members of the public may address the Council, beginning at 11:45 a.m. on Friday, November 21. Comments are limited to no more than five minutes per speaker or organization. As a courtesy, please inform Ms. Diane M. Gianelli, Director of Communications, in advance of your intention to make a public statement, and give your name and affiliation. To submit a written statement, mail or e-mail it to Ms. Gianelli at one of her contact addresses given above.