The bioethics and law paradox: an argument to maintain separateness with a hint of togetherness

This article analyses how bioethics and law interact and work together. The first half of the article provides definitions of both ethics and bioethics. The article then considers a number of different bioethical standpoints to demonstrate the variance of views in relation to bioethics. In addition, the first half of the article focuses on the different regulatory possibilities in regard to bioethical contexts. This demonstrates that law is of central importance to bioethics. This part also shows that even though law and ethics are often used simultaneously to achieve bioethical goals, law and ethics cannot be used interchangeably. Thus, even though it is somewhat inevitable that law will be used in the pursuit of the goals of bioethics, bioethics and bioethical principle should not be merely a vehicle for law-makers to utilise. The second half of the article focuses on the issues of autonomy and consent to demonstrate how law and ethics have developed in one of the foundation areas of bioethics.     

生命伦理学与21世纪的法律——西方生命伦理立法概览

生命伦理学与法学交叉领域研究近几十年来受到西方国家的重视，甚至被当作21世纪法律的核心。各国围绕生命的不同阶段和状态展开的一系列立法举措与法学研究使公民在生死、器官移植、基因信息与检测等方面的权利得到了保障。介绍与分析具有代表性的生命伦理立法例，说明涉及生命伦理的法律问题应当作为一个体系加强研究，借此为我国的生命伦理立法与法学研究提供有益的借鉴与启示。     

The current state of medical school education in bioethics, health law, and health economics.

Current challenges in medical practice, research, and administration demand physicians who are familiar with bioethics, health law, and health economics. Curriculum directors at American Association of Medical Colleges-affiliated medical schools were sent confidential surveys requesting the number of required hours of the above subjects and the years in which they were taught, as well as instructor names. The number of relevant publications since 1990 for each named instructor was assessed by a PubMed search. In sum, teaching in all three subjects combined comprises less than two percent of the total hours in the American medical curriculum, and most instructors have not recently published articles in the fields they teach. This suggests that medical schools should reevaluate their curricula and instructors in bioethics, health law, and health economics.     

Bioethics: A Field in Transition

Bioethics is clearly a field in transition, if not confusion. The author examines two questions at the core of this transition. First, how will bioethics accommodate the different training needs and professional interests of those who understand themselves to be primarily scholars of bioethics, and those who understand themselves to be primarily practitioners of bioethics? And second, whether bioethics will continue to function as an interdisciplinary field or whether it will morph into a discipline in its own right.     

Nanotechnology in Global Medicine and Human Biosecurity: Private Interests, Policy Dilemmas, and the Calibration of Public Health Law

This paper considers how best to approach dilemmas posed to global health and biosecurity policy by increasing advances in practical applications of nanotechnology. The type of nano-technology policy dilemmas discussed include: (1) expenditure of public funds, (2) public-funded research priorities, (3) public confidence in government and science and, finally, (4) public safety. The article examines the value in this context of a legal obligation that the development of relevant public health law be calibrated against less corporate-influenced norms issuing from bioethics and international human rights.     

The strengths and limitations of empirical bioethics

The past two decades have been witness to an "empirical turn" in bioethics. Whereas once this field of study concerned itself purely with theoretical analysis of ethical issues emerging in the design and delivery of health care, increasingly bioethics has embraced a range of empirical research methods from the social sciences and humanities. The emergence of "empirical bioethics" has, however, been the subject of enormous debate, both in regard to its methods and its purpose. For the most part these criticisms fail to appreciate the assumptions that underpin empirical bioethics or misrepresent the claims that are made about its moral utility. This article provides a brief account of the assumptions, strengths and limitations of empirical bioethics.     

Accounting for culture in a globalized bioethics.

How might a global bioethics account for profound cultural difference in a world marked by porous borders? The authors endorse a critical, self-reflexive bioethics, suggesting that bioethics needs to change its fundamental orientation if it is going to remain relevant and intellectually vibrant throughout the twenty-first century. Bioethics must attend to issue of social justice and public health, while seriously considering the implications of social context for medical morality. Negotiating moral consensus across cultural boundaries will be difficult, but is is more likely to succeed if we critically engage with the cultural assumptions underlying bioethics itself.     

Does Ethical Theory Have a Future in Bioethics?

Although there has long been a successful and stable marriage between philosophical ethical theory and bioethics, the marriage has become shaky as bioethics has become a more interdisciplinary and practical field. A practical price is paid for theoretical generality in philosophy. It is often unclear whether and, if so, how theory is to be brought to bear on dilemmatic problems, public policy, moral controversies, and moral conflict. Three clearly philosophical problems are used to see how philosophers are doing in handling practical problems: Cultural Relativity, and Moral Universality, Moral Justification, and Conceptual Analysis. In each case it is argued that philosophers need to develop theories and methods more closely attuned to practice. The work of philosophers such as Ruth Macklin, Norman Daniels, and Gerald Dworkin is examined. In the writings of each there is major methological gap between philosophical theory (or method) and practical conclusions. The future of philosophical ethics in interdisciplinary bioethics may turn on whether such gaps can be closed. If not, bioethics may justifiably conclude that philosophy is of little value.     

Property and the human body: a proposal for posthumous conception

There is no greater error in law and bioethics than the continuing opposition to applying the concept of property to posthumous conception cases and the human body generally. The aim of this article is to challenge this error and the assumptions underpinning it. The language of property, conceived of as a "web of interests", can be used to capture and identify the social, moral and ethical concerns that arise in cases concerning the human body, a position that finds support from a correct reading of the early High Court of Australia's decision in Doodeward v Spence (1908) 6 CLR 406. However, a key issue on which the language of property is silent is how to quantify the various competing interests in the posthumous conception case: the concept is useful only insofar as it provides the device for capturing the entirety of the posthumous conception problem.     

public Health Ethics From Foundations and Frameworks to Justice and Global public Health

Ethics dilemmas have been present throughout the history of public health, and bioethics has devoted considerable attention to issues relevant to public health. Only recently, however, has public health ethics emerged as a recognized subfield of bioethics. Public health ethics requires that public health improvement come through just and respectful means. Bioethics in the future not only will take on more issues of public ethics, but will apply it extensive scholarship in distributive justice to questions of global public health.     

MEDICALLY ASSISTED HUMAN REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGIES (ART) AND HUMAN RIGHTS — THE EUROPEAN PERSPECTIVE

The present article examines how the progress of science, and in particular, medically assisted human reproductive technologies (ART) have provoked a revolution in the sphere of family relations, generating a series of ethical and legal conflicts. The article focuses on the European perspective, without ignoring the international sphere, given the globalization of the phenomenon. The emerging legal issues are analyzed through the filter of international human rights, not only an important aspect to take into consideration in the context of bioethics in general, but a “passage obligé” given that certain concepts find their explanation and coordinates in international human rights law. It is from this perspective that the relationship between ART and human rights is presented. The applicable international and European legal instruments and principles shall be mentioned, as well as a brief comparison of national legal frameworks in Europe. The emerging bioethical and legal issues are examined in correlation with the response of the European Court of Human Rights through its case law aimed at balancing conflicting rights when faced with issues pertaining to ART. Lastly, the article presents in more detail the particular legal issues under debate in France and Italy, two European countries with specific legislation in the field.     

"Hindu" bioethics?

The author offers a commentary on the question, "Are there Hindu bioethics?" After deconstructing the term "Hindu," the author shows that there are indeed no Hindu bioethics. He shows that from a classical and Brahminical perspective, medicine is an inappropriate and impure profession.     

Passing on the Right conservative Bioethics is Closer Than It Appears

Like automobiles in the passenger side mirror, conservative bioethics is closer than it appears, and it has joined forces with the neo-conservative movement's rejection of moral relativism and moral pluralism. Leon Kass and about half of the current bioethics council appointed by President Bush form an interlocking world of journals, conferences, presidential advisors and, most notably, bioethics commission staff, all working to promote and extend federal regulation of public morals in the name of preserving real and romanticized societal norms in the face of social evolution wrought by technological change.     

FACE Facts: Why Human Genetics Will Always Provoke Bioethics

Some people dispute the relative importance of issues in genetics and biotechnology for the future of bioethics, either because they think the problems are time-limited or because they give priority to issue of human rights and social justice in health care. In fact, the special historical standing of genetic issue s in bioethics reflects four overlapping sources of moral sensitivity which ar inherent in the stories that genetic science tells and raise paradigmatic justice concerns: the implications of new genetic knowledge for people's understanding of their familial roles, ancestral origins, community memberships, and ethnic affiliations. Beneath worries over "genetic privacy," "the therapeutic gap," and the "post-human," this constellation of basic wellspring which both insures and justifies a central place for genetics on the agenda of bioethics.     

New Malaise: Bioethics and Human Rights in the Global Era

Recent transnational HIV research projects have raised questions about the ethics of research in developing countries, and with good reason. Lower ethical standards are often applied in these settings, yet the field of bioethics has remained relatively quiet on the subject, concerning itself primarily with issues that only affect affluent countries. Here we call for a new focus on equity and human rights in bioethics.     

The attack of the clones: patent law and stem cell research

This article considers the integral role played by patent law in respect of stem cell research. It highlights concerns about commercialization, access to essential medicines and bioethics. The article maintains that there is a fundamental ambiguity in the Patents Act 1990 (Cth) as to whether stem cell research is patentable subject matter. There is a need to revise the legislation in light of the establishment of the National Stem Cell Centre and the passing of the Research Involving Embryos Act 2002 (Cth). The article raises concerns about the strong patent protection secured by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and Geron Corporation in respect of stem cell research in the United States. It contends that a number of legal reforms could safeguard access to stem cell lines, and resulting drugs and therapies. Finally, this article explores how ethical concerns are addressed within the framework of the European Biotechnology Directive. It examines the decision of the European Patent Office in relation to the so-called "Edinburgh patent", and the inquiry of the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies into "The Ethical Aspects of Patenting Involving Human Stem Cells".     

法学视野下的人工器官产品研究

随着生物材料技术、免疫抑制技术、转基因和克隆工程的发展，人工器官正逐渐通过实验研究进入临床应用阶段，为解决器官捐献人不足开辟了新途径。受法律调整的人工器官应当包括人工材料制成的医疗设备和装置、利用干细胞技术培育的人工器官和组织、被敲除与人血不相容的动物DNA片段的动物器官和组织。人工器官与生命伦理密切相关，其造成的损害具有特殊性。警示、召回是人工器官缺陷的主要补救措施。人工器官分配除了应当考虑相对成功率、预期寿命和家庭角色，还应当考虑拟植入候选人的过去服务，以便体现公正原则。     

"Enhancing life?" Perspectives from traditional Chinese value-systems.

The author explores bioethics and "life enhancing" technology from the perspective of traditional Chinese value systems.