How Policies Enacted During COVID-19 Might Reduce Future Drug Spending
A positive outcome of the pandemic may be the demonstration via emergency measures that state governments can be flexible in substitution policies.
Beatrice Brown
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Read more: Racial Disparities Persist in Human Subjects Research Racial Disparities Persist in Human Subjects Research
Human subjects research has long been plagued by racial inequality. While flagrant abuses have been curtailed, disparities have, unfortunately, persisted.
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Read more: New Study Provides Insights into Potential Regulatory Treatment of COVID-19 Drugs New Study Provides Insights into Potential Regulatory Treatment of COVID-19 Drugs
Pandemics like COVID-19 certainly require the prompt approval of treatments, but efficacy and safety should not come at the cost of speed.
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Read more: Safer at Home? Yes, but Not According to the Wisconsin Supreme Court Safer at Home? Yes, but Not According to the Wisconsin Supreme Court
In Wisconsin, pushback against stay-at-home orders culminated in the state Supreme Court’s decision on May 13 to reverse the state’s “Safer at Home” policy.
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Read more: The Harms of Abortion Restrictions During the COVID-19 Pandemic The Harms of Abortion Restrictions During the COVID-19 Pandemic
These policies restricting abortion are unlikely to conserve PPE, and more importantly, they mischaracterize the nature and importance of abortions.
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Read more: Are Clinicians Without PPE Morally Obligated to Care for COVID-19 Patients? Are Clinicians Without PPE Morally Obligated to Care for COVID-19 Patients?
Clinicians should not be obligated to perform these heroic acts, nor should we morally blame them for their decision to refuse to provide care.
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Read more: The Ethical Allocation of Scarce Resources in the US During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Bioethics The Ethical Allocation of Scarce Resources in the US During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Bioethics
By Beatrice Brown Critical resources for handling the COVID-19 pandemic, including ventilators and ICU beds, are quickly becoming scarce in the US as the number and density of infections continue to rise. Leading bioethicists have crafted guidelines for the ethical rationing of these scarce resources during the pandemic. On March 16, The Hastings Center published…
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Read more: Is “Implied Consent” Ethically Permissible in WHO’s Malaria Vaccine Pilot Introduction? Is “Implied Consent” Ethically Permissible in WHO’s Malaria Vaccine Pilot Introduction?
By Beatrice Brown A recent BMJ article has exposed ethical concerns with the informed consent process in the World Health Organization’s (WHO) large, randomized cluster trial of the world’s first licensed malaria vaccine, RTS,S, known as Mosquirix. The study is being conducted in Malawi, Ghana, and Kenya, and 720,000 children will receive the vaccine. The…
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Read more: The Ethics of Dementia Advance Directives for Receiving Oral Food and Water The Ethics of Dementia Advance Directives for Receiving Oral Food and Water
By Beatrice Brown Last month, Kaiser Health News (KHN) told the story of Susan Saran, a woman diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia. According to KHN, Saran consulted a lawyer and signed an advance directive for dementia after experiencing two brain hemorrhages in 2018. The document directs caregivers to withhold hand feeding and fluids at the end…
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Read more: DNA Phenotyping Experiment on Uighurs Raises Ethical Questions About Informed Consent DNA Phenotyping Experiment on Uighurs Raises Ethical Questions About Informed Consent
By Beatrice Brown On December 3, The New York Times broke shocking news: China has been using the DNA of Uighurs, a Muslim minority group who have been facing increased persecution, to create an image of a person’s face using a process called DNA phenotyping. The Uighur men were living in Tumxuk (a city in…
