November Archive

Bad news for conservatives!

Michael Cook | 25 November 2011

People who have conservative moral judgements on a number of hot-button issues tend to have the “dark and socially destructive” personality traits of machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy, according to an article in the journal Neuroethics.

Oxford ethicist attacks conscientious objection

Michael Cook | 25 November 2011

Conscientious objection is guaranteed to give anyone who went to university in the 60s and 70s the warm fuzzies. It was the Everest of moral heroism. But times change. A recent debate in the Medical Journal of Australia features Oxford professor of ethics Julian Savulescu arguing that conscientious objection “is grounded in a dangerous moral relativism” and has no place in modern medicine.

Swedish academic argues for triparenting

Jared Yee | 25 November 2011

One parent is good. Two parents are better. Three parents might be better still. So argues a researcher from Sweden, who published a paper in the Journal of Medical Ethics on multiparenting.

Court will hear IVF benefits

Jared Yee | 25 November 2011

The US Supreme Court will hear a case about whether children conceived through IVF after the death of a parent are eligible for Social Security survivor benefits.

US mothers participate in clinical trials to make ends meet

Jared Yee | 25 November 2011

More cash-strapped mums are signing up for clinical trials.

One in five IVF procedures are in women over 40

Jared Yee | 25 November 2011

More older women than ever are using IVF in the UK.

Questions over clinical trials in India

Jared Yee | 24 November 2011

Western pharmaceutical companies have pinpointed India as a prime candidate for outsourcing clinical trials, due to its population and lax regulations, which help slash research costs.

Have embryonic stem cells crashed and burned?

Michael Cook | 19 November 2011

This is the way the joyride ends: Not with a bang but a whimper. An elevated epigraph seems appropriate for the final act of a dream which has sustained public support for human embryonic stem cell (hES cell) research for a decade. Only a year after launching a human trial for spinal cord injuries Geron Corp has pulled the plug on all stem cell research to focus on cancer drugs.

Austrian restrictions on IVF upheld

Michael Cook | 19 November 2011

The European Court of Human Rights has upheld an Austrian ban on sperm and ova donations. By a vote of 13 to 4, the Court’s Grand Chamber declared that the ban did not violate the European Convention on Human Rights.

Canadian expert report endorses euthanasia

Michael Cook | 19 November 2011

A lengthy report on euthanasia commissioned by the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) has strongly recommended the legalisation of assisted suicide and euthanasia. The six-person panel argues that this is consistent with Canadian values, and will not lead to an increase in elder abuse or a slippery slope from voluntary to non-voluntary euthanasia.

British Columbia’s supreme court to hear assisted suicide challenge

Michael Cook | 19 November 2011

The British Columbia Civil Liberties Association has launched a constitutional challenge to a ban on assisted suicide. It is representing several plaintiffs, including Gloria Taylor, a 63-year-old woman with the degenerative disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

Waste not, want not

Michael Cook | 19 November 2011

The editor of the leading journal Bioethics, Udo Schulenk regards capital punishment as a “barbaric practice”, it seems a shame to waste potentially life-saving organs of executed Chinese prisoners. It is a classic example of utilitarian reasoning.

Another celebrity surrogacy in UK

Michael Cook | 19 November 2011

Rebekah Brooks, the former editor of News of the World who was arrested over the phone hacking at the defunct tabloid, is in the headlines of London papers for something completely different. The tough-as-nails journalist, who looks a bit like a grown-up Hermione Granger, the female lead in the Harry Potter series, has announced that she and her horse trainer husband are expecting a baby in February. A surrogate baby, that is.

Marketing and science clash in Gardasil debate

Jared Yee | 18 November 2011

Gardasil, Merck’s vaccine against the human papilloma virus, the most common sexually transmitted disease, is once again at the centre of political, moral, bioethical and economic controversy after last month’s recommendation by the Centres for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) that 11 and 12-year-old boys be vaccinated.

Chimpanzee hepatitis C research in the firing line

Jared Yee | 18 November 2011

Experiments on chimpanzees have often horrified animal rights advocates and worried the medical community.

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