Forgotten and without Protections: Older Adults in Prison Settings
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):17-24. doi: 10.1002/hast.1540.ABSTRACTThe number of older adults incarcerated in prisons is growing significantly, and there is a great need for legal authority, processes, and resources to mitigate individual and social burdens of elder neglect and abuse within these settings. Older adults in prison may be particularly vulnerable to abuse, neglect, or exploitation. They are dependent on the carceral system for basic resources, are at risk for retaliatory actions for reporting mistreatment, and bear disproportionately high health burdens. This essay first considers standards and resources ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Jalayne J Arias Lillian Morgado Stephanie Grace Prost Source Type: research
The Problem Is Not (Merely) Mass Incarceration: Incarceration as a Bioethical Crisis and Abolition as a Moral Obligation
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):35-37. doi: 10.1002/hast.1542.ABSTRACTMass incarceration is an ethical crisis. Yet it is not only the magnitude of the system that is troubling. Mass incarceration has been created and sustained by racism, classism, and ableism, and the problems of the criminal legal system will not be solved without meaningfully intervening upon these forms of oppression. Beyond that, incarceration itself-whether of one person or 2 million-represents a moral failing. To punish and control, rather than invest in community and healing, is antithetical to the values of the field of bioethics. This commentary...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Jennifer Elyse James Source Type: research
Fifty Years of U.S. Mass Incarceration and What It Means for Bioethics
This article reviews some of that literature, illustrating why and how bioethicists can and should engage with the problem of mass incarceration as a remediable cause of health inequities. "Mass incarceration" refers to a phenomenon that emerged in the United States fifty years ago: imprisoning a vastly larger proportion of the population than peer countries do, with a greatly disproportionate number of incarcerated people being members of marginalized racial and ethnic groups. Bioethicists have long engaged with questions of health justice for incarcerated people, including consent issues for those participating in resear...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Sean A Valles Source Type: research
Clinician Moral Distress: Toward an Ethics of Agent-Regret
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):40-53. doi: 10.1002/hast.1544.ABSTRACTMoral distress names a widely discussed and concerning clinician experience. Yet the precise nature of the distress and the appropriate practical response to it remain unclear. Clinicians speak of their moral distress in terms of guilt, regret, anger, or other distressing emotions, and they often invoke them interchangeably. But these emotions are distinct, and they are not all equally fitting in the same circumstances. This indicates a problematic ambiguity in the moral distress concept that obscures its distinctiveness, its relevant circumstances, an...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Daniel T Kim Wayne Shelton Megan K Applewhite Source Type: research
Preventing Another Fifty Years of Mass Incarceration: How Bioethics Can Help
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):37-39. doi: 10.1002/hast.1543.ABSTRACTIn the article "Fifty Years of U.S. Mass Incarceration and What It Means for Bioethics," Sean Valles provides an important reminder of the consequences of mass incarceration in the United States and identifies potential roles for bioethicists in addressing this system. My limited view-that of a physician who conducts court-ordered investigations and monitoring of health services behind bars-is that the ongoing failure of most academic and professional organizations to be more effective in this much-ignored area stems from the lack of leaders and staff ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Homer Venters Source Type: research
Big Mistake: Knowing and Doing Better in Patient Engagement
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):2. doi: 10.1002/hast.1537.ABSTRACTPushing back on policies favored by dying patients is a challenging endeavor, requiring tact, engagement, openness to bidirectional learning, and willingness to offer alternative solutions. It's easy to make missteps, especially in the age of social media. Holly Fernandez Lynch shares her experience learning with and from the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) community, first as a caricature of an ivory tower bioethicist and more recently as a trusted advisor, at least for some. Patient-engaged bioethics doesn't mean taking the view that patients are alw...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Holly Fernandez Lynch Source Type: research
Lockdowns, Bioethics, and the Public: Policy-Making in a Liberal Democracy
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):11-17. doi: 10.1002/hast.1539.ABSTRACTCommentaries on the ethics of Covid lockdowns nearly all focus on offering substantive guidance to policy-makers. Lockdowns, however, raise many ethical questions that admit of a range of reasonable answers. In such cases, policy-making in a liberal democracy ought to be sensitive to which reasonable views the public actually holds-a topic existing bioethical work on lockdowns has not explored in detail. In this essay, I identify several important questions connected to the kind of influence the public ought to have on lockdown decision-making, includi...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: S Andrew Schroeder Source Type: research
Making the World Safer and Fairer in Pandemics
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):3-10. doi: 10.1002/hast.1538.ABSTRACTGlobal health has long been characterized by injustice, with certain populations marginalized and made vulnerable by social, economic, and health disparities within and among countries. The pandemic only amplified inequalities. In response to it, the World Health Organization and the United Nations have embarked on transformative normative and financial reforms that could reimagine pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response (PPPR). These reforms include a new strategy to sustainably finance the WHO, a UN political declaration on PPPR, a fundamental...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Lawrence O Gostin Kevin A Klock Alexandra Finch Source Type: research
Forgotten and without Protections: Older Adults in Prison Settings
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):17-24. doi: 10.1002/hast.1540.ABSTRACTThe number of older adults incarcerated in prisons is growing significantly, and there is a great need for legal authority, processes, and resources to mitigate individual and social burdens of elder neglect and abuse within these settings. Older adults in prison may be particularly vulnerable to abuse, neglect, or exploitation. They are dependent on the carceral system for basic resources, are at risk for retaliatory actions for reporting mistreatment, and bear disproportionately high health burdens. This essay first considers standards and resources ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Jalayne J Arias Lillian Morgado Stephanie Grace Prost Source Type: research
The Problem Is Not (Merely) Mass Incarceration: Incarceration as a Bioethical Crisis and Abolition as a Moral Obligation
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):35-37. doi: 10.1002/hast.1542.ABSTRACTMass incarceration is an ethical crisis. Yet it is not only the magnitude of the system that is troubling. Mass incarceration has been created and sustained by racism, classism, and ableism, and the problems of the criminal legal system will not be solved without meaningfully intervening upon these forms of oppression. Beyond that, incarceration itself-whether of one person or 2 million-represents a moral failing. To punish and control, rather than invest in community and healing, is antithetical to the values of the field of bioethics. This commentary...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Jennifer Elyse James Source Type: research
Fifty Years of U.S. Mass Incarceration and What It Means for Bioethics
This article reviews some of that literature, illustrating why and how bioethicists can and should engage with the problem of mass incarceration as a remediable cause of health inequities. "Mass incarceration" refers to a phenomenon that emerged in the United States fifty years ago: imprisoning a vastly larger proportion of the population than peer countries do, with a greatly disproportionate number of incarcerated people being members of marginalized racial and ethnic groups. Bioethicists have long engaged with questions of health justice for incarcerated people, including consent issues for those participating in resear...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Sean A Valles Source Type: research
Clinician Moral Distress: Toward an Ethics of Agent-Regret
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):40-53. doi: 10.1002/hast.1544.ABSTRACTMoral distress names a widely discussed and concerning clinician experience. Yet the precise nature of the distress and the appropriate practical response to it remain unclear. Clinicians speak of their moral distress in terms of guilt, regret, anger, or other distressing emotions, and they often invoke them interchangeably. But these emotions are distinct, and they are not all equally fitting in the same circumstances. This indicates a problematic ambiguity in the moral distress concept that obscures its distinctiveness, its relevant circumstances, an...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Daniel T Kim Wayne Shelton Megan K Applewhite Source Type: research
Preventing Another Fifty Years of Mass Incarceration: How Bioethics Can Help
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):37-39. doi: 10.1002/hast.1543.ABSTRACTIn the article "Fifty Years of U.S. Mass Incarceration and What It Means for Bioethics," Sean Valles provides an important reminder of the consequences of mass incarceration in the United States and identifies potential roles for bioethicists in addressing this system. My limited view-that of a physician who conducts court-ordered investigations and monitoring of health services behind bars-is that the ongoing failure of most academic and professional organizations to be more effective in this much-ignored area stems from the lack of leaders and staff ...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Homer Venters Source Type: research
Big Mistake: Knowing and Doing Better in Patient Engagement
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):2. doi: 10.1002/hast.1537.ABSTRACTPushing back on policies favored by dying patients is a challenging endeavor, requiring tact, engagement, openness to bidirectional learning, and willingness to offer alternative solutions. It's easy to make missteps, especially in the age of social media. Holly Fernandez Lynch shares her experience learning with and from the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) community, first as a caricature of an ivory tower bioethicist and more recently as a trusted advisor, at least for some. Patient-engaged bioethics doesn't mean taking the view that patients are alw...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: Holly Fernandez Lynch Source Type: research
Lockdowns, Bioethics, and the Public: Policy-Making in a Liberal Democracy
Hastings Cent Rep. 2023 Nov;53(6):11-17. doi: 10.1002/hast.1539.ABSTRACTCommentaries on the ethics of Covid lockdowns nearly all focus on offering substantive guidance to policy-makers. Lockdowns, however, raise many ethical questions that admit of a range of reasonable answers. In such cases, policy-making in a liberal democracy ought to be sensitive to which reasonable views the public actually holds-a topic existing bioethical work on lockdowns has not explored in detail. In this essay, I identify several important questions connected to the kind of influence the public ought to have on lockdown decision-making, includi...
Source: The Hastings Center Report - December 22, 2023 Category: Medical Ethics Authors: S Andrew Schroeder Source Type: research
