Guest Post: Jeremy Snyder Paper:Appealing to the crowd: ethical justifications in Canadian medical crowdfunding campaigns Medical crowdfunding is a practice where users take advantage of the power of social networks to raise funds related to medical needs from friends, family, and strangers by sharing fundraising appeals online. Popular venues include GiveForward, GoFundMe, and YouCaring, among […]
Category: JME
Gene Editing For A Long Life – A No Brainer?
Guest Post: Isabelle L Robertson Paper: Student Essay- Designing Methuselah: an ethical argument against germline genetic modification to prolong human longevity I am 16 years old. I am at the start of my life and looking towards my future, deciding on universities, career options and how I want my life to be. At the moment […]
Debate: The Fiction of an Interest in Death? Justice for Charlie Gard
Julian Savulescu Dominic Wilkinson’s Response A judge ruled last week that baby Charlie Gard will have his treatment withdrawn, against the wishes of his parents. His doctors argued that the rare mitochondrial disease (MDDS) he was born with was causing him unbearable suffering. His parents had raised funds to take him to the US […]
Debate Reponse: Charlie Gard, Interests and Justice – an alternative view
Dominic Wilkinson Responding to Julian Savulescu The sad and difficult case of Charlie Gard, which featured in the media last week, is the latest in a series of High Court and Family court cases when parents and doctors have disagreed about medical treatment for a child. Doctors regard the treatment as “futile” or “potentially inappropriate”. […]
Treatment of Premature Ejaculation: Alleviating Sexual Dysfunction, Disease Mongering, or Both?
by Brian D. Earp / (@briandavidearp) An interesting new paper, “Distress, Disease, Desire: Perspectives on the Medicalization of Premature Ejaculation,” has just been published online at the Journal of Medical Ethics. According to the authors, Ylva Söderfeldt, Adam Droppe, and Tim Ohnhäuser, their aim is to “question the very concept of premature ejaculation and ask whether it […]
Conscientious Objection Accommodation in Healthcare – Clashing Perspectives
by Brian D. Earp / (@briandavidearp) On behalf of the Journal of Medical Ethics, I would like to draw your attention to the current issue, now available online, which is almost entirely dedicated to the vexing question of conscientious objection in healthcare. When, if ever, should a healthcare provider’s personal conviction about the wrongness of some intervention (be it […]
So, What is Not to Like about 3D Bioprinting?
Guest Post: Gill Haddow & Niki Vermeulen Paper: 3D bioprint me: a socioethical view of bioprinting human organs and tissues Picture this: It is twenty years’ from now and , one of your organs has stopped functioning properly or even at all. You will not need to wait in the long line of the human […]
Response to ‘A Matter of Life and Death: Controversy at the Interface Between Clinical and Legal Decision-Making in Prolonged Disorders of Consciousness’
Guest Post: Julian Sheather, British Medical Association Response to: A matter of life and death: controversy at the interface between clinical and legal decision-making in prolonged disorders of consciousness (also available as a blog summary) The law has to work in generalities. The prohibitions it imposes and the liberties it describes are set for all of […]
How to Keep HIV Cure-Related Trials Ethical: The Benefit/Risk Ratio Challenge
Guest Post by Nir Eyal Re: Special Issue of the Journal of Medical Ethics on the ethics and challenges of an HIV cure For most patients with HIV who have access to antiretroviral treatment and use it properly, that treatment works well. But the holy grail of HIV research remains finding a cure. Sometimes that […]
Bridging the Education-action Gap: A Near-peer Case-based Undergraduate Ethics Teaching Programme
Guest Post: Dr Selena Knight and Dr Wing May Kong Paper: Bridging the education-action gap – a near-peer case-based undergraduate ethics teaching programme Medical ethics and law is a compulsory part of the UK undergraduate medical school curriculum. By the time they qualify, new junior doctors will have been exposed to ethics teaching in lectures and […]