BACKGROUND The impact of presumed consent on donation rates has been widely debated. In June 2013 Greece adopted a 'soft' presumed consent law for organ and tissue donation, where relatives' approval is sought prior to organ removal. AIMS To report on the knowledge, attitudes and concerns of undergraduate students, enrolled in three health science disciplines, in regards to organ donation and...

BACKGROUND AIDS, SARS, and the recent epidemics of the avian-flu have all served to remind us the debate over the limits of the moral duty to care. It is important to first consider the question of whether or not the "duty to treat" might be subject to contextual constraints. The purpose of this study was to investigate the opinions and beliefs held by both physicians and dentists regarding the...

In Western countries, the legal procurement of cadaveric human organs is everywhere organized as a gi!-exchange. Yet despite this basic similarity, donation rates vary widely, and this fact is o!en overlooked in debates about the merits of gi!versus marketbased systems. I investigate the sources of variation in procurement rates using time-series data from seventeen oecd countries. I focus on t...

The influence of demographic and socioeconomic factors on the public's attitude towards a presumed consent system (PCS) of organ donation was estimated in 2 scenarios: without and with a priority allocation scheme (PAS). Self-administered questionnaires were completed by 775 respondents. Using multiple logistic regressions, respondents' objections to donating organs in both scenarios were estim...

This article explores the differences between the activities of ethical deliberation in the academy and in the public domain, in particular in the work of bodies appointed to advise government. It draws attention to the collegiate nature of their work, the constraints imposed by their constitution, and the need to incorporate attention to the sociopolitical context. It argues that such ‘‘public...

The ongoing legal and bioethics debates on consent requirements for collecting, storing, and utilizing human biological material for purposes of basic and applied research—that is, genomic research biobanking—have already managed to pass through three ostensibly dissimilar stages: during the last two decades or so, a mudslide of research papers, policies, and guidelines have been produced advoc...

THE FIRST TOPIC discussed by the panelists was collaboration between ethicists and medical professionals to elaborate a system of ethical assessment related to all transplantation activities. The necessity of such a system was agreed to be undisputable. Mutual consultation requires a common language, fully understandable by both parties. One of the panelists, an ethicist with a good medical bac...