Ethical Challenges of Advances in Vaccine Delivery Technologies
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):13-15. doi: 10.1002/hast.1563.ABSTRACTStrategies to address misinformation and hesitancy about vaccines, including the fear of needles, and to overcome obstacles to access, such as the refrigeration that some vaccines demand, strongly suggest the need to develop new vaccine delivery technologies. But, given widespread distrust surrounding vaccination, these new technologies must be introduced to the public with the utmost transparency, care, and community involvement. Two emerging technologies, one a skin-patch vaccine and the other a companion dye and detector, provide excellent examples ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Arthur L Caplan Kyle Ferguson Anne Williamson Ethics and Policy Working Group on New Vaccine Delivery Technologies Source Type: research
Brain Pioneers and Moral Entanglement: An Argument for Post-trial Responsibilities in Neural-Device Trials
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):24-33. doi: 10.1002/hast.1566.ABSTRACTWe argue that in implanted neurotechnology research, participants and researchers experience what Henry Richardson has called "moral entanglement." Participants partially entrust researchers with access to their brains and thus to information that would otherwise be private, leading to created intimacies and special obligations of beneficence for researchers and research funding agencies. One of these obligations, we argue, is about continued access to beneficial technology once a trial ends. We make the case for moral entanglement in this context thro...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Sara Goering Andrew I Brown Eran Klein Source Type: research
Neuroscience and Society: Supporting and Unsettling Public Engagement
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):20-23. doi: 10.1002/hast.1565.ABSTRACTAdvancing neuroscience is one of many topics that pose a challenge often called "the alignment problem"-the challenge, that is, of assuring that science policy is responsive to and in some sense squares with the public's values. This issue of the Hastings Center Report launches a series of scholarly essays and articles on the ethical and social issues raised by this vast body of medical research and bench science. The series, which will run under the banner "Neuroscience and Society," is supported by the Dana Foundation and seeks to promote deliberativ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Gregory E Kaebnick Source Type: research
Identity Theft, Deep Brain Stimulation, and the Primacy of Post-trial Obligations
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):34-41. doi: 10.1002/hast.1567.ABSTRACTPatient narratives from two investigational deep brain stimulation trials for traumatic brain injury and obsessive-compulsive disorder reveal that injury and illness rob individuals of personal identity and that neuromodulation can restore it. The early success of these interventions makes a compelling case for continued post-trial access to these technologies. Given the centrality of personal identity to respect for persons, a failure to provide continued access can be understood to represent a metaphorical identity theft. Such a loss recapitulates th...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Joseph J Fins Amanda R Merner Megan S Wright Gabriel L ázaro-Muñoz Source Type: research
Care or Complicity? Medical Personnel in Prisons
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):2. doi: 10.1002/hast.1560.ABSTRACTImprisonment may sometimes be a justified form of punishment. Yet the U.S. carceral system suffers from appalling problems of justice-in who is put into prisons, in how imprisoned people are treated, and in downstream personal and community health impacts. Medical personnel working in prisons and jails take on risky work for highly vulnerable and underserved patients. They are to be lauded for their professional commitments. Yet at the same time, prison care undercuts the ability of medical personnel to uphold their own professional standards and sometimes...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Rebecca L Walker Source Type: research
Digital Humans to Combat Loneliness and Social Isolation: Ethics Concerns and Policy Recommendations
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):7-12. doi: 10.1002/hast.1562.ABSTRACTSocial isolation and loneliness are growing concerns around the globe that put people at increased risk of disease and early death. One much-touted approach to addressing them is deploying artificially intelligent agents to serve as companions for socially isolated and lonely people. Focusing on digital humans, we consider evidence and ethical arguments for and against this approach. We set forth and defend public health policies that respond to concerns about replacing humans, establishing inferior relationships, algorithmic bias, distributive justice,...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Nancy S Jecker Robert Sparrow Zohar Lederman Anita Ho Source Type: research
Challenging Disability Discrimination in the Clinical Use of PDMP Algorithms
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):3-7. doi: 10.1002/hast.1561.ABSTRACTState prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) use proprietary, predictive software platforms that deploy algorithms to determine whether a patient is at risk for drug misuse, drug diversion, doctor shopping, or substance use disorder (SUD). Clinical overreliance on PDMP algorithm-generated information and risk scores motivates clinicians to refuse to treat-or to inappropriately treat-vulnerable people based on actual, perceived, or past SUDs, chronic pain conditions, or other disabilities. This essay provides a framework for challenging PDMP algori...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Elizabeth Pendo Jennifer Oliva Source Type: research
Hidden Ethical Challenges in Health Data Infrastructure
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):15-19. doi: 10.1002/hast.1564.ABSTRACTData infrastructure includes the bureaucratic, technical, and social mechanisms that assist in actions like data management, analysis, storage, and sharing. While issues like data sharing have been addressed in depth in bioethical literature, data infrastructure presents its own ethical considerations, apart from the actions (such as data sharing and data analysis) that it enables. This essay outlines some of these considerations-namely, the ethics of efficiency, the visibility of infrastructure, the power of standards, and the impact of new technologi...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Nicole Contaxis Source Type: research
Ethical Challenges of Advances in Vaccine Delivery Technologies
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):13-15. doi: 10.1002/hast.1563.ABSTRACTStrategies to address misinformation and hesitancy about vaccines, including the fear of needles, and to overcome obstacles to access, such as the refrigeration that some vaccines demand, strongly suggest the need to develop new vaccine delivery technologies. But, given widespread distrust surrounding vaccination, these new technologies must be introduced to the public with the utmost transparency, care, and community involvement. Two emerging technologies, one a skin-patch vaccine and the other a companion dye and detector, provide excellent examples ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Arthur L Caplan Kyle Ferguson Anne Williamson Ethics and Policy Working Group on New Vaccine Delivery Technologies Source Type: research
Brain Pioneers and Moral Entanglement: An Argument for Post-trial Responsibilities in Neural-Device Trials
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):24-33. doi: 10.1002/hast.1566.ABSTRACTWe argue that in implanted neurotechnology research, participants and researchers experience what Henry Richardson has called "moral entanglement." Participants partially entrust researchers with access to their brains and thus to information that would otherwise be private, leading to created intimacies and special obligations of beneficence for researchers and research funding agencies. One of these obligations, we argue, is about continued access to beneficial technology once a trial ends. We make the case for moral entanglement in this context thro...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Sara Goering Andrew I Brown Eran Klein Source Type: research
Neuroscience and Society: Supporting and Unsettling Public Engagement
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):20-23. doi: 10.1002/hast.1565.ABSTRACTAdvancing neuroscience is one of many topics that pose a challenge often called "the alignment problem"-the challenge, that is, of assuring that science policy is responsive to and in some sense squares with the public's values. This issue of the Hastings Center Report launches a series of scholarly essays and articles on the ethical and social issues raised by this vast body of medical research and bench science. The series, which will run under the banner "Neuroscience and Society," is supported by the Dana Foundation and seeks to promote deliberativ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Gregory E Kaebnick Source Type: research
Identity Theft, Deep Brain Stimulation, and the Primacy of Post-trial Obligations
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):34-41. doi: 10.1002/hast.1567.ABSTRACTPatient narratives from two investigational deep brain stimulation trials for traumatic brain injury and obsessive-compulsive disorder reveal that injury and illness rob individuals of personal identity and that neuromodulation can restore it. The early success of these interventions makes a compelling case for continued post-trial access to these technologies. Given the centrality of personal identity to respect for persons, a failure to provide continued access can be understood to represent a metaphorical identity theft. Such a loss recapitulates th...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Joseph J Fins Amanda R Merner Megan S Wright Gabriel L ázaro-Muñoz Source Type: research
Care or Complicity? Medical Personnel in Prisons
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):2. doi: 10.1002/hast.1560.ABSTRACTImprisonment may sometimes be a justified form of punishment. Yet the U.S. carceral system suffers from appalling problems of justice-in who is put into prisons, in how imprisoned people are treated, and in downstream personal and community health impacts. Medical personnel working in prisons and jails take on risky work for highly vulnerable and underserved patients. They are to be lauded for their professional commitments. Yet at the same time, prison care undercuts the ability of medical personnel to uphold their own professional standards and sometimes...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Rebecca L Walker Source Type: research
Digital Humans to Combat Loneliness and Social Isolation: Ethics Concerns and Policy Recommendations
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):7-12. doi: 10.1002/hast.1562.ABSTRACTSocial isolation and loneliness are growing concerns around the globe that put people at increased risk of disease and early death. One much-touted approach to addressing them is deploying artificially intelligent agents to serve as companions for socially isolated and lonely people. Focusing on digital humans, we consider evidence and ethical arguments for and against this approach. We set forth and defend public health policies that respond to concerns about replacing humans, establishing inferior relationships, algorithmic bias, distributive justice,...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Nancy S Jecker Robert Sparrow Zohar Lederman Anita Ho Source Type: research
Challenging Disability Discrimination in the Clinical Use of PDMP Algorithms
Hastings Cent Rep. 2024 Jan;54(1):3-7. doi: 10.1002/hast.1561.ABSTRACTState prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) use proprietary, predictive software platforms that deploy algorithms to determine whether a patient is at risk for drug misuse, drug diversion, doctor shopping, or substance use disorder (SUD). Clinical overreliance on PDMP algorithm-generated information and risk scores motivates clinicians to refuse to treat-or to inappropriately treat-vulnerable people based on actual, perceived, or past SUDs, chronic pain conditions, or other disabilities. This essay provides a framework for challenging PDMP algori...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - February 23, 2024 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Elizabeth Pendo Jennifer Oliva Source Type: research
