Monash bioethics review
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It is generally recognised that public health problems in the developing world are dire and that the rest of the world has a moral commitment to provide assistance. Yet many of the world's poor are unable to access essential pharmaceuticals simply because products that are under patent are too expensive and cheaper generics are not available. ⋯ However, this solution will provide no assistance in countries that lack the capacity to manufacture pharmaceuticals. This article discusses the extensive international negotiations occurring during the last couple of years that seek to provide an appropriate balance between access rights and patent rights.
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Monash bioethics review · Apr 2002
Patient-centred equipoise and the ethics of randomised controlled trials.
The ethical pre-condition of randomised controlled trials is, at present, the presence of equipoise. This refers to an opinion of the investigator that there is uncertainty as to the merits of the treatments being compared. It is argued that since the decision to enrol is the potential subject's, the investigator's opinion is not ethically relevant. ⋯ It is shown that trial enrolment is normally easily the best strategy for achieving a good outcome, and that trials currently thought to be unethical may be in patient-centred equipoise. This is so for three reasons: (1) patients in trials receive superior care, (2) trial enrolment minimises the risk of being a victim of a therapeutic disaster and (3) health professionals make mistakes, and a 50% chance of receiving the worse treatment until a trial reports is always better than any chance of receiving the worse treatment indefinitely. It is concluded that so long as the standard of professional conduct is the furtherance of patients' objective interests randomised controlled trials are ethical.
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I discuss the Principle of Double Effect (PDE) as a means of exploring aspects of the motivation of active voluntary euthanasia (a.v.e). It is argued that the objective of a.v.e. is not death but the relief of suffering. ⋯ However, I point out that a central strength of the PDE is its insistence on due proportionality between outcomes. When a.v.e. is appropriate, as sometimes it is, death is not out of proportion to the relief of suffering.
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Some patients who attempt suicide refuse treatment. These patients are invariably treated if brought to hospital. ⋯ Some patients who attempt suicide ought to be allowed to die. My argument for this claim turns on judging some patients who attempt suicide to be sufficiently competent and rational be allowed to die.