March 11, 2010
Healthy elderly people who are simply “tired of living” could be allowed to end their lives with a lethal injection under new euthanasia laws being debated by the Dutch parliament. (Telegraph)
March 11, 2010
Clinical trials focus on new drugs, which doesn’t help doctors compare the effectiveness of one treatment with another. (Los Angeles Times)
March 11, 2010
AMERICAN scientists have for the first time unlocked the genetic code of an entire family, and made a startling discovery – that parents pass on fewer mutations than previously thought. Scientists had long believed that each parent passed on some … Read More
March 11, 2010
Richard Doerflinger doesn’t look the part of a high-powered political strategist. Bearded and bespectacled, he works in a small, cluttered office out of one of Washington’s less fashionable neighborhoods, far from the lobbying bastions of K Street. (NPR)
March 10, 2010
Last week the US Ambassador visited the Medical School to meet with Maltese doctors to discuss the US health plan. He came across as a humble person, actually asking us about our system and how they, as Americans, can learn … Read More
March 10, 2010
It’s been one year since President Barack Obama lifted the Bush era’s eight-year ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. Read excerpts from producer Susan Goldstein’s and correspondent Betty Rollin’s recent interview about ethical guidelines, current research, and … Read More
March 10, 2010
Criticisms of the ethical justification of antidoping legislation are not uncommon in the literatures of medical ethics, sports ethics and sports medicine. Critics of antidoping point to inconsistencies of principle in the application of legislation and the unjustifiability of ethical … Read More
March 10, 2010
Many people are worried that the health-care reform proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats will fail to bend the “cost curve.” A number of commentators are urging no votes because of this, and Republicans have asked the president to … Read More
March 10, 2010
I have proposed that a scenario of slower-than-disruptive tech development over the next 15-20 years combined with weak or reduced opposition to human enhancement could result in “increasing irrelevance†for transhumanists. But what exactly does that mean? (IEET)
March 10, 2010
Dr. Peter J. Pronovost, 45, is medical director of the Quality and Safety Research Group at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, which means he leads that institution’s quest for safer ways to care for its patients. He also travels the … Read More
March 10, 2010
Disability groups are split over a Family Court decision to approve the sterilisation of an 11-year-old girl. Family Court judge Paul Cronin found that the performance of a hysterectomy on the child, identified only as Angela, was “in the child’s … Read More
March 9, 2010
Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) can infect bone marrow cells — including, possibly, hematopoietic stem cells, according to a study published online today (March 7) in Nature. The findings suggest the virus can hide in an inactive state for long periods … Read More
March 9, 2010
The UK Human Tissue Authority (HTA) has issued an official warning that unlawful collections of umbilical cord blood have been taking place in the UK, and that such instances ‘may compromise safety and quality standards’. (PHG Foundation)
March 9, 2010
THE JUDGE Rotenberg Center in Canton, which stands alone in its use of painful skin shocks to eradicate self-mutilation and sudden assault, is a storehouse of ethical and medical dilemmas. But it’s no shock – and no shame – that … Read More
March 9, 2010
Among patients with advanced heart failure, blacks and Hispanics are less likely to receive hospice care than whites, researchers found. After adjustment for sociodemographic, clinical, and geographic factors, blacks were 41% less likely to have hospice care than whites (OR … Read More
March 9, 2010
The judge who sentenced an Oregon couple to prison Monday for the death of their son says members of their church must quit relying on faith healing when their children’s lives are at stake. (The Associated Press)
March 9, 2010
A campaign to give elderly people in the Netherlands the right to assisted suicide said Monday it has gathered more than 100,000 signatures, hoping to push the boundaries another notch in the country that first legalized euthanasia. (The Associated Press)
March 9, 2010
When 87-year-old Bunny Olenick suffered a massive stroke in December 2008, doctors told her family there was no chance she could recover fully, although her limitations probably wouldn’t be known for months. A neurologist told her sons that if she … Read More
March 8, 2010
Studies in Ethics, Law, and Technology (Volume 3, Issue 3, 2009) is now available by subscription only. Articles include: “Nanotechnologies and Equal Access to Healthcare” by Eduardo Missoni and Guglielmo Foffani. “The Impact of Nanomedicine Development on North-South Equity and … Read More
March 8, 2010
Sociology of Health & Illness (Volume 32, Issue 2, February 2010) is now available by subscription only. Articles include: “A Sociological Approach to Ageing, Technology and Health” by Kelly Joyce and Meika Loe, 171-180. “A History of the Future: The … Read More
March 8, 2010
A challenge to the state’s assisted-suicide law will face a major test Monday in Superior Court in Hartford. Two Fairfield County doctors, Gary Blick and Ronald M. Levine, sued the state last year hoping to ensure that doctors who prescribe … Read More
March 8, 2010
It is feared that English libel law may be making it possible for financially well endowed groups to effectively silence scientific dissent about their own claims. (PHG Foundation)
March 8, 2010
From January 16, 2002, to June 11, 2009, I served on the President’s Council on Bioethics. Chaired first by Leon Kass (2001–2005) and then by Edmund Pellegrino (2005–2009), the Council met thirty-six times. Of its original eighteen members, nine served … Read More
March 8, 2010
Those who debate insurance reform in Washington and pit public against privately funded care are framing the problem incorrectly. Here’s a better way to think about it: Economists are wrong in asserting that competition controls costs. Most often innovation and … Read More
March 8, 2010
Young adults who were conceived through in-vitro fertilization are doing as well as the average young American as far as physical health, though their rates of certain psychological problems appear elevated, a new study finds. (Reuters)
