Monash Bioethics ReviewPub Date : 2025-06-01Epub Date: 2025-03-01DOI: 10.1007/s40592-025-00232-7
Andreas Albertsen
{"title":"Ending the organ trade: an ethical assessment of regulatory possibilities.","authors":"Andreas Albertsen","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00232-7","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s40592-025-00232-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>While the trade of human organs are illegal and widely condemned, a black market flourishes. Estimates indicate that 10% of kidney transplants from living donors involve illegal payments to the kidney seller. This paper presents a typology for approaches aimed at curtailing the black market in human organs. The policies are evaluated from two perspectives: their ethical permissibility and their expected efficiency in ending and minimizing the trade in human organs. To end or minimize organ trading, we must reduce the organ shortage in order to reduce demand for organs, alleviate poverty to reduce the supply of organs, and disincentivize brokers and medical facilitators through a concerted effort to reduce the profit rate of the international organ trade.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":"150-165"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12202555/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143537861","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Monash Bioethics ReviewPub Date : 2025-06-01Epub Date: 2025-02-25DOI: 10.1007/s40592-025-00235-4
Oskar Lindholm, Sakari Karjalainen, Veikko Launis
{"title":"Chasing 'vulnerability' across six decades of the Declaration of Helsinki.","authors":"Oskar Lindholm, Sakari Karjalainen, Veikko Launis","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00235-4","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s40592-025-00235-4","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The year 2024 marked the 60th anniversary of the World Medical Association's Declaration of Helsinki (DoH). Coincidentally, the WMA published the 8th revision of this landmark document guiding medical research involving human subjects. One of the key changes in this latest revision concerns the notion of vulnerability, which has always been central to the DoH's ethos. The term 'vulnerability' was explicitly introduced in the 5th revision, published in 2000, which lists five vulnerable groups. Subsequent revisions have significantly altered how vulnerability is portrayed and understood within the document. This article traces the conceptualisation of vulnerability across the various versions of the DoH, culminating in its recently published 8th revision. We explore the underlying principles of each revision and examine how these principles have both influenced and been influenced by broader ethical discourses. Lastly, we address some of the challenges that future revisions must meet to ensure that the document remains internally coherent and practically applicable for researchers and research ethics committees alike.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":"1-33"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12202679/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143504655","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Richard T Bellis, Sally Frampton, Gina Hadley, Jennifer Wallis, Alan Bleakley, Gabriele De Luca
{"title":"Teaching humanities in UK medical schools: towards community-building and coherence.","authors":"Richard T Bellis, Sally Frampton, Gina Hadley, Jennifer Wallis, Alan Bleakley, Gabriele De Luca","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00249-y","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00249-y","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Medical humanities teaching in UK medical schools has lacked cohesion, having developed opportunistically in different locations. Cohesion is necessary to develop an identifiable community of practice, but within that community there can be multiple readings of what 'medical humanities' are and how they may develop. This article details discussions held by medical humanities scholars teaching in UK medical schools at a workshop in January 2025 at the University of Oxford covering five key areas: the role of humanities scholars in medical schools, patients as partners in medical education, core curriculum teaching, intercalated teaching, and assessment. Our discussion highlights opportunities and challenges facing humanities teaching in UK medical schools today and calls for the creation of a community of medical humanities scholars working in UK medical education embracing diversity of opinion and practices. The article is specifically written as a synopsis of a brainstorming symposium.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-05-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144162595","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Human enhancement, past and present.","authors":"Andrew Moeller, Jose Maria Andres Porras","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00250-5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00250-5","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>One important role the medical humanities might and should play relates to public education. In this instance, we mean helping persons to think about their own aims or purposes as potential receivers of enhancement interventions, and similarly helping to inform the developers of said interventions. This article argues that, in the light of real and speculative applications of emerging biotechnologies and artificial intelligence aimed at human enhancement-including germline genetic engineering, the linking of the human brain with an artificial general intelligence by way of a brain-computer interface, and various interventions directed toward life extension-historians would do well to consider the following three practices as they participate in the medical humanities and the shared task of public education: (1) Taking under scrutiny a broad swath of topics and timeframes as it relates to past efforts aimed at human enhancement; (2) Focusing on past engagement with enhancement efforts and their perceived relation to the pursuit of living well; and (3) Entering into debates on enhancement as equal participants. In support of these assertions, this article takes efforts directed towards the prolongation of life in medieval Europe as an illustrative example. It also highlights continuities and discontinuities between past and present justifications for human enhancement, and addresses how similarities and differences can shape and challenge contemporary bioethical arguments.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-05-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144152080","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Contemporary human rights violations in female sterilization care: legal and ethical considerations when coerced patients do consent.","authors":"Liana Woskie, Mindy Jane Roseman","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00240-7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00240-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In this piece we examine three forms of coercive or otherwise involuntary care that can occur with patient consent. To do so, we examine: (1) uninformed consent, (2) contingency-based consent and (3) constrained-market consent, amongst female sterilization patients. While there is broad recognition that \"coercion\" in sterilization care can manifest beyond instances of overt force and clarity on what constitutes coercion within clinical care, this has not translated to accountability. The current practice of identifying coercion through discrete civil cases may facilitate a narrow understanding of its contemporary prevalence; one that does not align with definitions of coercion supported by international human rights entities. We use three acute, and widely recognized, examples-hysterectomies in ICE detention facilities, India's sterilization camp deaths and birth control quotas for Uyghur women-as an entry point to highlight less overt contemporary forms of coercive sterilization care, pairing each example with data that explores prevalence at a broader population level. These data suggest less visible forms of coercion may persist relatively unchallenged-raising the ethical case for a functional approach to the measurement of coercion. In turn, we argue the relevant question may not be \"when is coercion ethically justified in public health,\" but rather, why is coercion already the status quo?</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-05-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144054285","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Death talk and access gaps: applying a personalist lens to address inequities for children with complex conditions at the end of life.","authors":"Christina M Lamb, Karen Cook","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00246-1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00246-1","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Children with complex care needs lack access to Specialized Pediatric Palliative care in Canada. At the same time, death is increasingly being handled in a mechanized and specialized manner, with hospitals becoming the expected place for death to occur. Although this is true for some children, the meaning of dying and death is obscured for dying children in Canadian healthcare. Specifically, discussions about dying and death, what they are and what they mean to children are relatively absent in Canadian healthcare contexts. This lack of death talk is a problem for children with medically complex conditions and their families since death is a part of living, and palliative care is essential for children who are living and dying with medical complexity. To address the health disparity that these children face concerning access to pediatric palliative care and having honest conversations about death, it is essential to attend to the bioethics and care frameworks undergirding pediatric healthcare to understand how the meaning of living, dying and death is being valued for this population. Subsequently, in this paper, we will explore a personalist bioethics approach to mitigate these end-of-life disparities.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-05-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144040774","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Proper care for the profoundly disabled depends on theology being recognized as queen of medical humanities.","authors":"Charles Camosy","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00247-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00247-0","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Despite the rise of the medical humanities in general in recent decades, theological bioethics-during a very similar period of time-was marginalized from many central bioethical discussions. This is problematic for a number of reasons. First, because theologians invented the discipline of bioethics and deserve a place at the table. Second, because the marginalization is often ideologically motivated. And third, because the vision of the human person that theologians bring to the table is essential for understanding the moral status of the proundly disabled.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-05-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144014636","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Safura Abdool Karim, Maxwell J Smith, Diego S Silva, Marlyn Faure, Liana Woskie, Deborah Nyirenda, Cai Heath, Vittoria Porta, Jeffery Jones, Sadie Regmi, MacKenzie Isaac, Jonathan Shaffer, Tess Johnson
{"title":"Coercing for public health: reflections on the role of coercion in public health emergencies.","authors":"Safura Abdool Karim, Maxwell J Smith, Diego S Silva, Marlyn Faure, Liana Woskie, Deborah Nyirenda, Cai Heath, Vittoria Porta, Jeffery Jones, Sadie Regmi, MacKenzie Isaac, Jonathan Shaffer, Tess Johnson","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00245-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00245-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The workshop, Coercing for Health: Transdisciplinary Approaches to the Ethics of Coercive Public Health Policies was held at the University of Oxford on July 3rd and 4th, 2024. This paper provides both a summary of the workshop proceedings and reflections and directions for future research on coercive public health measures. The workshop consisted of four key parts: defining coercion; history and legal analysis of coercion; public health ethics perspectives on coercion; experiences of coercive public health measures. According to our reflections, some important questions remaining for further research include: what is the difference between coercion and enforcement? Who gets to define and address coercion? How do structural factors affect health and experiences of coercion? We encourage others to continue to work on this important area, to ensure the ethically acceptable and thoughtful implementation of any future coercive measures in the sphere of public health.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144055393","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Joseph K. visits the sick house: how the medical humanities require the medical posthumanities.","authors":"Martin J Fitzgerald, Peter J Katz","doi":"10.1007/s40592-025-00242-5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s40592-025-00242-5","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This paper challenges the typical function of narrative in the medical humanities to advocate for a medical posthumanities: an approach that destabilizes the centrality of \"the human\" and instead embraces patient narratives that are embodied, fragmented, and provisional. To make this claim, we first challenge the stability of the \"humanity\" described in the \"medical humanities\" and reiterated in the genre that we call \"the medical romance.\" In this genre, illness and suffering destabilize a sense of identity and coherence, which is then restored through introspection and interpretation of the patient narrative. To challenge this genre, we turn to surface reading, a literary studies technique that sees traditional interpretation as too hurriedly foreclosing on meaning. Through a close reading of Franz Kafka's The Trial and Henrik Ibsen's Hedda Gabler, we demonstrate both what surface reading looks like and also how it embraces generic and interpretive instability. Finally, we focus this approach to narrative on physician-assisted suicide (PAS), particularly attending to PAS and disability, to argue that both medical romance and its entailed traditional narrative interpretation overvalue \"the human\" as an agential individual seeking a \"good death.\" This at once affirms the tendency to encourage the allegedly meaningful death of disabled people by PAS, and also excludes from narrative focus the structural and environmental sources of suffering. The medical posthumanities, in its attention to embodiment, networks, environment, and the decentralizing of individual agents, would better make room for patient narratives that value the messiness and interconnectedness of lived experience.</p>","PeriodicalId":43628,"journal":{"name":"Monash Bioethics Review","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2025-04-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144033780","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}