1. Fundamental principles of personalism and utilitarianism One must state in the very beginning that medical ethics develops not so much under the influence of philosophical views, but under the influence of growing empirical sciences, which can create scientistic mentality, under the influence of legal decisions of various international or national medical organisations, under the influence o...

BACKGROUND The increase in the volume of research conducted in Low and Middle Income Countries (LMIC), has brought a renewed international focus on processes for ethical conduct of research. Several programs have been initiated to strengthen the capacity for research ethics in LMIC. However, most such programs focus on individual training or development of ethics review committees. The objectiv...

Normative conclusions in economics are usually based upon a set of assumptions which are untenable in the health sector. Persistence with these assumptions highlights a more fundamental problem: the epistemology of normative economics—the methodology for drawing conclusions with respect to the improvement of social well-being—is itself flawed. Orthodox economics does not include a process for s...

Ethics in relation to the practice of medicine had continuity from the time of Hippocrates (ca. 460-377 BC) to the 1970s focusing on the physician-patient relationship and moral obligations of beneficence and nonmaleficence. In the 1970s developments such as the gene splicing method and in vitro fertilization (IVF) created concerns about the adequacy of these long-established moral obligations ...

Ethical perspectives on the use of stimulants to enhance human cognitive performance (neuroenhancement) are polarized between conservative and liberal theories offering opposing advice on whether individuals have a right to use neuroenhancers and what the social outcomes of neuroenhancement might be. Meanwhile, empirical evidence shows modest prevalence and guarded public attitudes toward the n...