10th Annual Reproductive Ethics Conference
2026-01-22 08:00 - 2026-01-23 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
Hosted by the Institute for Bioethics & Health Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB), the Reproductive Ethics Conference is an annual, interdisciplinary gathering focused on exploring the ethical, legal, social, and cultural dimensions of reproductive health. The field of reproductive ethics is shaped by ongoing advances in medical technology, shifting cultural norms, political and ideological divisions, and theological perspectives—factors that continue to raise complex and often controversial questions. This conference provides a forum for rigorous and respectful dialogue on a wide range of issues in reproductive ethics. We welcome participants from all professional backgrounds to foster a rich and collaborative discussion.
Send abstracts and questions to reproethics@utmb.edu
The goal of this conference is to explore the range of topics addressed in reproductive ethics. We welcome individuals from all professional fields to create a rich and robust discussion.
We are seeking abstracts for individual presentations, 3-4 person panels, and posters. Please limit abstracts to 250 words for presentations and posters and 500 words for panels.
Abstracts should be sent to repro.ethics@utmb.edu by September 15, 2025. Submissions will receive a response by Mid-October.

2026 Compassionate Use & Preapproval Access Conference (CUPACon)
2026-01-23 08:30 - 2026-01-24 16:30 (America/New_York) | Boston University School of Law, 765 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA, 02215, United States
For the 1st time: being held in Boston; hosted by BU School of Law!

Join us for this 2-day multi-stakeholder event covering the most pressing ethical issues in preapproval access to medical products.
Day 1 (1/23): These workshops are NOT included in the cost of CUPACon registration. In order to attend 1 of the 2 optional pre-conference workshops––occuring the morning of 1/23/26––(for an additional fee), click “Get Tickets”, scroll down to “Pre-Conference Workshops” then select from these two choices:

Preapproval Access to Psychedelics
When Preapproval Access Spans National Borders

Day 2 (1/24): These workshops are included in the cost of the in-person conference. Remote attendees will not have access. When you click “Get Tickets”, scroll down to “Free Workshops” then select from the three available choices.
See you in Boston (or online)!
We are very excited to be able to offer CUPACon 2026 as a primarily in-person event. In-person attendees will be able to take advantage of interactive workshops, networking opportunities, a cocktail reception, and other perks. For those unable to attend in-person, tickets providing access to a livestream of main-stage conference sessions are available. Virtual attendees will not have access to workshops or other events (networking, etc.) not occuring on “the main stage”!
Please note: In-person tickets are being offered on a tiered pricing scale based upon the stakeholder group to which you belong; please purchase the ticket that best matches your background. Tickets are for both conference days; no single day tickets are being offered. Tickets are transferrable but non-refundable.
CUPACon 2026 is sponsored in part by Bionical Emas and BU School of Law.

CARE Panel: Intimacy, Vulnerability, and Risks of Harm in Research
2026-01-26 12:00 - 13:15 (America/New_York) | Online
The Center for Ethics and Human Values at the Ohio State University invites you to our upcoming Conversations About Research Ethics (CARE) virtual panel. Please feel free to share with interested students and colleagues. This panel is free and open to the public, but registration is required.
CARE Panel: Intimacy, Vulnerability, and Risks of Harm in Research
MONDAY, JANUARY 26TH | 12:00-1:15 PM EST
This panel will examine how intimacy and vulnerability in research relationships may give rise to unique and often overlooked forms of harm. Moving beyond traditional accounts of physical or informational risk, the discussion will explore how violations of trust, emotional exposure, and relational boundaries raise important ethical questions across research setting
Panelists:

Jasmine Gunkel, PHD (Western University, Ontario)

Mikaela Smith, PHD (College of Public Health, The Ohio State University)

Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Healthcare Law
2026-02-02 09:00 - 17:30 (America/New_York) | Touro Cross River Campus, 3 Times Square, New York, NY, United States
This year’s symposium will focus on artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare. Speakers will include experts in healthcare law, technology, bioethics, and policy. Their contributions will explore the rapidly evolving intersection of AI technologies and healthcare regulation.

Medicine and the Holocaust: Modern Implications for Professional Identity, Bioethics, and Health Professions Education
2026-02-03 08:00 - 16:30 (America/New_York) | Inperson, 3640 Colonel Glenn Highway,, Dayton,, OH, 45435, United States
Date: Tuesday, February 3rd, 2026
Location: Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio (Live-Streaming Remote Viewing Option Available)
Cost: FREE
Register to attend @ https://forms.office.com/r/fcSs57GjFe

Please don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions regarding the event.

Ethics of Using Artificial Intelligence in Research and Writing: Emerging Issues
2026-02-05 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly transforming the nature of research and scholarly writing. Although the use of AI offers many benefits to scientific research and academic scholarship, it also creates ethical challenges concerning bias, authorship, transparency, accountability, and public trust. This talk examined some of the ethical issues raised by using artificial intelligence in scientific research and scholarly writing and discussed some proposed solutions.

Working with What’s Missing: Ethical Strategies for Incomplete Data
2026-02-09 12:00 - 13:15 (America/New_York) | Online
Missing, inaccessible and incomplete data have long shaped the ways researchers frame studies and understand the limits of their work. Join us for a panel discussion where we will explore a number of questions concerning these persistent conditions of missingness:

What ethical obligations arise when the data we need isn’t available or may never have existed?
How can researchers responsibly interpret and represent gaps, silences and absences in data?
When can collaboration with communities help preserve or reimagine data that is at risk of disappearing?

Together, we’ll consider how the research community can adapt its practices to work ethically and creatively with what’s missing.
This event will be held online and is open to the public.

This event is presented in partnership with the Center for Ethics and Human Values’ CARE Program.

Black History Month Event: The Legacy of the Tuskegee Report
2026-02-12 17:00 - 18:00 (America/New_York) | Online
The Tuskegee Report—developed by Tuskegee University’s National Center for Bioethics in Research and Health Care in collaboration with Vanderbilt University—seeks to redefine bioethics at the intersection of research with human subjects, clinical trials, medicine, and public health by centering the voices, experiences, histories and cultural identities of populations disproportionately impacted by unethical research practices and unequal care. This Black History Month conversation, hosted by Harvard Medical School’s Center for Bioethics, will feature Dr. David Augustin Hodge, Sr. and Dr. T.S. Harvey, facilitated by Dr. Rebecca Brendel. Together, they will explore how the perspectives of BIPOC populations—rooted in resilience, memory, and lived experience—must be foundational in shaping the next generation of ethical frameworks for research, medicine, and public health.
Speakers:

T. S. Harvey, PhD, Associate Professor of Medical and Linguistic Anthropology and Global Health at Vanderbilt University
David Augustin Hodge, Sr., PhD, DMin, MEd, MTS, Director (Interim), Lead Ethicist, and Research Professor at the National Center for Bioethics in Research and Healthcare at Tuskegee University

Moderator:

Rebecca Weintraub Brendel, MD, JD, Director of the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School

Register here to receive the Zoom link and call-in details in your automated confirmation email.
The recording will be uploaded to our YouTube channel in the weeks following the event date, pending no technical issues. Registrants will receive a follow-up email containing the recording link when it is ready.
Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University. This series is co-organized by the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics, the National Center for Bioethics in Research and Health Care at Tuskegee University, and the Office for Culture and Community Engagement at Harvard Medical School.

Three Ways of Looking at Black/White Mortality Inequality in the United States
2026-02-13 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
A basic demographic fact about the United States is that, on average, White people live longer than Black people. But what, concretely, does this fact mean? Drawing from a diverse set of social science, health, and literary sources, this talk argues that research has three families of strategy for making sense of the size of mortality disparities — distribution-based, action-based, and meaning-based measures — and provides new empirical results in each vein that collectively aim to put demographic measurement onto a more human footing. Implications for thinking about redress for racial harms are discussed.
Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, PhD, is an associate professor at the University of Minnesota. A sociologist and demographer, she studies racial inequality in mortality in the historical and contemporary United States, and specializes in finding comparisons and metrics that illuminate the human meaning of mortality disparities. She has extensively researched the Covid-19 pandemic in Minnesota, where she also co-founded an award-winning community vaccination organization (the Seward Vaccine Equity Project). She is also a demographic methodologist, developing models designed to clarify relationships between micro and macro perspectives on population processes. She was until recently the Associate Director of the Minnesota Population Center and is currently a Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation.

The Society for Christian Bioethicists Conference: "The End of Life, the Gift of Life: reflections on death and organ donation"
2026-02-20 08:00 - 2026-02-22 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
The Society for Christian Bioethicists is happy to announce our upcoming conference, “The End of Life, the Gift of Life: reflections on death and organ donation.” The conference will take place February 20-22, 2026. It will be online via Zoom and registration will be free. See the attached conference flyer, and share it with all who may be interested.
The conference will include keynote and plenary addresses, as well as parallel sessions of paper presentations. We will begin to accept submissions of abstracts in October.
Registrants from our last conference will not receive further communication about the upcoming conference, so if you wish to continue to receive communication from the Society, please sign up for the Society’s email list. Additionally, follow us on X and Facebook.
More information available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pBBnHHe0HECNugp0i_OAFOD5Llkfp0RDCZfWm8RxCBk/edit?tab=t.0
And in case you have not yet already seen them, see the video recordings of the Keynote and plenary sessions from last year’s conference, including:

David Hershenov, “The Minimum Metaphysics Needed for a Pro-Life Ethic”

Erika Bachiochi, “Lessons from America’s Earliest Female Doctors and Advocates for Women”

John Lennox, “Fearfully and Wonderfully Remade? The Challenge of Transhumanism”

Margaret Battin and Kristin Collier, a debate on “Physician-Assisted Suicide/MAiD, Dignity, Autonomy”

An International Comparison: Legal, Regulatory, and Ethical Approaches to AI in Health Care
2026-02-20 12:30 - 13:30 (America/New_York) | Online
In this webinar, speakers will describe the international legal, regulatory, and ethical frameworks governing applications of AI in health care. They will compare approaches, discussing the opportunities and challenges, as well as the need for transparency, accountability, and guiding ethical principles in developing AI systems in health care. Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University.
Presenters:

I. Glenn Cohen, JD, James A. Attwood and Leslie Williams Professor of Law, Deputy Dean, and Faculty Director, Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology & Bioethics at Harvard Law School
Timo Minssen, JD, Professor of Law at the University of Copenhagen (UCPH); Founder and Managing Director of UCPH’s Center for Advanced Studies in Biomedical Innovation Law (CeBIL); LML Research Affiliate at the University of Cambridge (UK); and Inter-CeBIL Research Affiliate, Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology & Bioethics at Harvard Law School

Moderator:

Barry Solaiman, PhD, LLM, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Associate Professor of Law at HBKU Law, Qatar; Adjunct Assistant Professor of Medical Ethics in Clinical Medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine – Qatar (WCM-Q); Fellowship Alum, Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics

Register here to receive the Zoom link and call-in details in your automated confirmation email. The seminar recording will be uploaded to our YouTube channel in the weeks following the event date, pending no technical issues. Registrants will receive a follow-up email containing the recording link when it is ready.

Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University. Organized by seminar leaders Leah Rand, DPhil and Aaron S. Kesselheim, MD, JD, MPH. Co-hosted by the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School, the Program on Regulation, Therapeutics, and Law (PORTAL), and the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School.

Caring for the Whole Patient: The Interplay between Spirituality and the Delivery of Care
2026-02-21 08:30 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Burnett School of Medicine at TCU, TX, United States
Healthcare in a Civil Society 2026 Symposium
Caring for the Whole Patient: The Interplay between Spirituality and the Delivery of Care
Saturday, February 21, 2026 | 8:30 AM – 1:00 PM CST
How should clinicians engage patients’ spiritual beliefs without crossing professional boundaries? What happens when those beliefs shape—or challenge—medical decision-making? And how can healthcare professionals respond ethically and compassionately when values and clinical recommendations collide?
The Tarrant County Medical Society’s Ethics Consortium invites you to Healthcare in a Civil Society 2026, a half-day symposium bringing together clinicians, ethicists, chaplains, and scholars to explore the role of spirituality in contemporary healthcare. This year’s program focuses on caring for patients as whole persons—biological, psychological, social, and spiritual.
The symposium features a keynote address by Jeff Bishop, MD, PhD (Saint Louis University), two dynamic panel discussions moderated by The Hon. Pete Geren, interactive breakout sessions, and an applied ethics segment led by Stuart Pickell, MD, MDiv (Burnett School of Medicine at TCU). Panelists represent medicine, ethics, social work, and chaplaincy, offering diverse perspectives grounded in real clinical experience. Panelists include Devan Stahl, PhD (Baylor University) Kimbell Kornu, MD, PhD (Belmont University), Angela MacDonald, MDiv, MSW (John Peter Smith Hospital) and Stephen Couch, MA (Dallas Children’s Hospital).
Format:

In-person at the Burnett School of Medicine at TCU (Fort Worth, TX), with a full breakfast provided
Virtual attendance via Zoom, including participation in breakout sessions

Continuing Education:

4 hours of Ethics CE credit available for multiple healthcare professions

Registration Fees:

CE Credit: $40
General: $25
Students: $10

Join colleagues from across disciplines for thoughtful dialogue, practical ethical tools, and meaningful connection around one of the most challenging and human dimensions of care.

Conflict Resolution and Clinical-Setting Mediation for Healthcare
2026-02-23 - 2026-02-26
Conflict in healthcare endangers patients, distresses families, disrupts the workplace, fuels burnout and sparks ethical conundrums. Resolving conflicts peacefully and durably helps preserve relationships and avoid dis-integration.
“Conflict Resolution and Clinical-Setting Mediation for Healthcare” is a learn-by-doing training enabling clinical-setting professionals – – bioethicists, physicians, nurses, legal counsel, administrators, chaplains, social workers, ethics committee members, and others – – to provide a wide range of assistance, from coaching, to informal negotiation and facilitation, to mediation.
This training is online for 4 days, with limited enrollment to ensure a fully intimate and engaging experience.

Consumer Genetic Testing for Cancer and Cardiovascular Disease Risk: Test-Taker Outcomes and Ethical Concerns
2026-02-23 17:15 - 18:45 (America/New_York) | University of Pennsylvania, 3600 Civic Center Blvd, Room 8-031, Philadelphia, PA, United States
BIO: Madison Kilbride, PhD, MSME, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Utah. She earned her PhD in Philosophy from Princeton University and her MS in Medical Ethics from the University of Pennsylvania. She also completed a fellowship in the Penn Postdoctoral Training Program in the Ethical, Legal and Social Implications (ELSI) of Genetics and Genomics. Dr. Kilbride’s ELSI research focuses on consumer genetic testing for disease risk. Her work also explores questions about the ethical obligations created by genetic knowledge and the limits of medical gatekeeping in an era of unprecedented access to health information.

Dallas Conference on Science & Faith
2026-02-28 08:30 - 16:30 (America/Chicago) | Park Cities Baptist Church, 3933 Northwest Parkway, Dallas, TX, 75225, United States
Join us at the 8th-Annual Dallas Conference on Science & Faith hosted by Park Cities Baptist Church in Dallas, TX, on February 28. The conference will feature keynote speaker and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, along with philosopher of science Stephen C. Meyer, neurosurgeon Michael Egnor, author and filmmaker John G. West, award-winning engineer Stuart Burgess, and many others. Continue reading for more information on the conference theme, confirmed speakers, and recommended hotels. Registration opens November 1.

The Future of Research Ethics: Threats & Opportunities
2026-03-04 09:00 - 15:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
The history of research ethics shows that ensuring the ethical and responsible conduct of research requires investment of time, personnel, and resources. Major shifts under way now raise questions about the future of research ethics — how to ensure needed safeguards while taking advantage of potential opportunities. Speakers will consider the impact of significant changes in federal ethics personnel and research funding, including debate about overhead (“indirect cost”) recovery on grants, which at many institutions supports crucial ethics oversight. This conference will consider how to preserve key safeguards while making improvements.
Join national experts from multiple disciplines and perspectives to consider a wide range of questions: what is the current state of research ethics, how can we strengthen Institutional Review Boards and research oversight, what steps will best support research integrity and trustworthy science, what strategies will advance ethics in community-engaged research, and how should research ethics evolve to manage emerging technologies including artificial intelligence.
The University of Minnesota’s 11th Annual Research Ethics Day Conference will consider how to move forward in a changing landscape and how to adapt while maintaining the crucial elements of research ethics. As a public, research university, we aim to explore these vital issues with our faculty, staff, students, and community, as well as a national audience.
This event is free and open to the public. It’s sponsored by the University of Minnesota’s Research & Innovation Office (RIO); Consortium on Law and Values in Health, Environment & the Life Sciences; Masonic Cancer Center; and Clinical and Translational Science Institute.

Williams Lecture: Bioethical Responsibilities in the Era of Global Warming
2026-03-04 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
J. Richard Williams Lectureship Series
Established in 2013, this lecture series honors J. Richard Williams, Sr., MD, a Tulane graduate and dedicated Selma physician known for his compassion, service, and published cancer research. Reflecting his lifelong commitment to patient-centered care, the series highlights the importance of trust and empathy in the patient–physician relationship.

The Conscience of Care: Navigating Health in the Culture Wars
2026-03-05 09:00 - 10:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Dov Fox, DPhil, JD, LLM will engage pressing challenges for biomedicine against the backdrop of our rapidly shifting legal, economic, social, and healthcare environments. More details coming soon! This event is co-hosted by the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School and the Petrie Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School. Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University.

U.S. Immigration Detention: Bioethical Transgressions and Imperatives
2026-03-05 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
While issues related to immigration detention are often in the news, less discussed are the specific bioethical breaches that have occurred since its inception and worsened as the number of people detained has skyrocketed. This talk will discuss the current state of U.S. immigration detention, specific areas where bioethical principles and norms have been most grossly violated, and the areas that most need light shone on them in order to improve the care of those detained.

The Ethics of Access and Outcomes: Maternity Care in Rural US Communities
2026-03-07 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
This presentation will tackle core concepts related to safety during childbirth: access to and outcomes of care, with a focus on rural U.S. communities. It will present research findings on declining access to obstetric care in rural communities, what happens when rural communities lose obstetric services, and why hospitals close obstetric units. It will also consider the path forward, describing strategies to ensure that rural maternity care is safe, viable, and accessible.

A Social Justice Framework for Neurodivergent Adults: Shifting to a Supported Engagement Model
2026-03-12 13:00 - 14:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
Speakers: Kayhan Parsi & Nanette Elster

Constrained Choice: Autonomy and Reproductive Genomics in Pregnancy Outcomes
2026-03-13 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Prenatal screening, carrier testing, and emerging precision medicine tools are rapidly integrating into reproductive care. Yet these technologies operate within healthcare systems that racialize genetic risk, constrain meaningful choice, and unevenly distribute access to care. In punitive reproductive policy environments, receiving genetic information during pregnancy can result in surveillance, coercion, and structurally constrained decision-making. Rather than alleviating inequities, genomics may reproduce longstanding disparities in reproductive health.
This forum examines how genomic technologies can be governed and implemented in ways that center reproductive dignity and autonomy. Drawing on decolonial feminist frameworks and empirical analysis of healthcare delivery, it identifies evidence-based system-level strategies that support informed decision-making without reinforcing structural harm. By focusing on healthcare system pathway beyond individual choice, this discussion advances a model of genomics-informed pregnancy care grounded in equity, accountability, and reproductive justice.
This session will be moderated by Jennifer James, PhD, with panelists Khiara M. Bridges, PhD, and Jallicia Jolly, PhD.

Environmentally Sustainable Health Research: The Ethics in the Tools
2026-03-16 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Feature Lecture Presenter: Federica Lucivero, PhD, Ethox Centre
CREEi Center for Global Bioethics and ASBH Environmental Bioethics Affinity Group Annual Lecture

The Stories We Tell: Putting Ethics into Practice in Caring for Our Patients, Our Colleagues and Ourselves External Inbox
2026-03-23 - 2026-03-24
Please join us in Atlanta for our 31st annual Healthcare Ethics Consortium conference, hosted by the Emory University Center for Ethics.
The conference will address The Stories We Tell: Putting Ethics into Practice in Caring for Our Patients, Our Colleagues, Ourselves.
We welcome in-person and virtual participation for 2 days of excellent speakers, participant engagement working sessions, discussion, and sharing of frameworks and models relevant to practice.
Session topics include: engaging patient narratives; storytelling as pedagogy in healthcare education; effecting change through narrative; myths, misconceptions and stigma; narrative methods in practice.
Opening speakers include:

Martha Montello, PhD, Lecturer in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. She has trained medical students, graduate students, fellows and clinicians in narrative approaches to clinical ethics since 1990.
Riva Lehrer, Instructor in Medical Humanities at Northwestern University, is an artist, writer and curator who focuses on the socially challenged body. Ms Lehrer’s work has been featured in the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian, the United Nations and museums throughout the U.S.. Her memoir, Golem Girl, was published in 2020.

Our onsite location is the Emory Conference Center on the Emory University campus in Atlanta.
Virtual attendees will be involved in breakout sessions for all workshops, in addition to sessions with speakers and panelists.
Registration for in-person participants is Friday, March 6, 2026 by 11:59 pm EST.
Registration for virtual participants is Friday, March 20, 2026 by 5:00 pm EST.
We do not want funding to be an obstacle for those wishing to participate.
We have limited scholarships funds available for partial or full registration fees.
For further information about funding, please email your request to hec@emory.edu with subject line “Conference Scholarships”.
Applications for CME, CNE and Social Work hours are currently under review and CEU certificates will be provided to all attendees.
Please let us know if you have other questions. (hec@emory.edu)
We look forward to your joining these 2 days of interdisciplinary discussion and skill-building,

Collaborating with Non-Academic Organizations
2026-03-23 12:00 - 13:15 (America/New_York) | Online
Panelists:
Jamie Levine Daniel, PhD, Associate Professor of Nonprofit Management and Public Service (New York University)

Navigating Moral Distress and Professional Well-Being Through Compassionate Pedagogy
2026-03-24 | BRB 251, Biomedical Research Bldg II/III, 421 Curie Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, United States
BIO: Tessy A. Thomas, DO, MBE is an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Bioethics at Geisinger in Danville, PA. She is a Pediatric Critical Care Physician working at Geisinger-Janet Weis Children’s Hospital’s Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. As a bioethics scholar she works within the Department of Bioethics and Decision Sciences with a focused passion in exploring the depths of moral distress and professional integrity of healthcare professionals. She is also the Graduate Medical Education Director for Professionalism in the Clinical Learning Environment.

Festschrift Honoring Tom L. Beauchamp (1939-2025)
2026-03-26 08:30 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | Lohrfink Auditorium, Rafik B. Hariri Building, Georgetown University Hilltop Campus, Washington, DC, United States
Georgetown University’s Kennedy Institute of Ethics, in partnership with the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics, will host this Festschrift on Thursday, March 26, 2026 to honor the life, work, and enduring legacy of philosopher and bioethics pioneer
Tom L. Beauchamp (1939–2025).
The all-day event will bring together leading scholars whose work has been shaped by Beauchamp’s foundational contributions to ethical theory, research ethics,
animal rights, and public policy.
James Childress, University of Virginia
David DeGrazia, George Washington University
Christine Grady, National Institutes of Health
Jeffrey Kahn, Johns Hopkins University
Eva Feder Kittay, SUNY Stony Brook
Henry Richardson, Georgetown University

The Ethics of Access and Outcomes: Maternity Care in Rural US Communities
2026-03-27 12:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online
This presentation will tackle core concepts related to safety during childbirth: access to and outcomes of care, with a focus on rural U.S. communities. It will present research findings on declining access to obstetric care in rural communities, what happens when rural communities lose obstetric services, and why hospitals close obstetric units. It will also consider the path forward, describing strategies to ensure that rural maternity care is safe, viable, and accessible.
Learning Objectives: After this webinar, attendees will be able to:
Quantify declining access to obstetric care in rural communities.
Describe what happens when rural communities lose obstetric services.
Understand why hospitals close obstetric units.
Discuss what could help keep rural maternity care viable and accessible, including case studies of hospitals and communities providing rural maternity care.

This is an event of the Office of Academic Clinical Affairs (OACA), hosted by the Center for Bioethics, and co-sponsored by the following U of MN Units: Business Advancement Center for Health (BACH), Minnesota Carlson; Center for the Study of Political Psychology, College of Liberal Arts; Community-University Health Care Center (CUHCC); Department of Pediatrics, Medical School; Eli Coleman Institute for Sexual and Gender Health, Medical School; Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication, College of Liberal Arts; Medical School; Minnesota Population Center; Program in Health Disparities Research, Medical School; Rural Health Research Center; School of Dentistry; School of Nursing; School of Public Health.
Speaker(s)
Katy Backes Kozhimannil, PhD, MPA, is a Distinguished McKnight University Professor in the Division of Health Policy and Management, University of Minnesota School of Public Health. Dr. Kozhimannil is the Co-Director of the University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center and the University of Minnesota Rural Health Program. In 2025, she was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in recognition of her research and policy leadership to improve maternal and child health, particularly in rural and Native American communities. She lives on Dakota land (Mahto Bde). Her ancestors come from northern Minnesota (Gaa-waabaabiganikaag Anishinaabeg, the White Earth Nation), Germany and France. She earned a PhD at Harvard University, an MPA at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, and a BA at the University of Minnesota.
Dr. Kozhimannil conducts research to inform health policy that supports people at critical times in their lives, including pregnancy and childbirth. Referencing her research and recommendations, new local, state, and federal laws have allocated resources to improve access to prenatal, obstetric, and postpartum care, focusing on communities that face challenges accessing high quality care, including rural communities. She teaches courses that build skills for engagement in public health programs, policy, and research, and she works extensively to engage with and inform leaders with the power to improve the health and well-being of individuals, families, and communities, starting at birth.

Protecting Whistleblowers and Fighting Fraud
2026-03-27 12:30 - 13:30 (America/New_York) | Online
Whistleblowers serve the public when they expose fraud in government-funded health care programs, leading to millions of dollars in recovered costs. Though laws protect whistleblowers, it still takes great moral courage and leaves individuals exposed to negative consequences. In this seminar, we are joined by two experts in health care fraud to discuss fraud detection and whistleblower protection. Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University.
Presenters:

Taryn Vian, PhD, Professor, University of San Francisco, School of Nursing and Health Professions
Maya Efrati, JD, MPP, Director of Legislation and Congressional Affairs, Government Accountability Project

Moderator:

Alexander Egilman, Senior Research Assistant, PORTAL, Brigham and Women’s Hospital

Register here to receive the Zoom link and call-in details in your automated confirmation email. The seminar recording will be uploaded to our YouTube channel in the weeks following the event date, pending no technical issues. Registrants will receive a follow-up email containing the recording link when it is ready.

Support provided by the Oswald DeN. Cammann Fund at Harvard University. Organized by seminar leaders Leah Rand, DPhil and Aaron S. Kesselheim, MD, JD, MPH. Co-hosted by the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School, the Program on Regulation, Therapeutics, and Law (PORTAL), and the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School.

Leveraging a Sturdy Norm: How Ethicists Really Argue
2026-04-02 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online
Presented by David DeGrazia, PhD
