Ethics | LocalHealthGuide

Are no-nicotine hiring policies fair?

The policies are raising concern around labor and medical ethics, because by targeting smokers they disproportionately harm the poor.

December 20, 2019 Doctors / Drugs / Ethics

Doctors Prescribe More of a Drug If They Receive Money from a Pharma Company Tied to It

Pharmaceutical companies have paid doctors billions of dollars for consulting, promotional talks, meals and more. Doctors who received payments linked to specific drugs prescribed more of those drugs.

December 6, 2019 Ethics

Federally Funded Health Researchers Disclose at Least $188 Million in Conflicts of Interest. Can You Trust Their Findings?

By David Armstrong and Annie Waldman, ProPublica Federally funded health researchers reported more than 8,000 “significant” financial conflicts of interest

October 4, 2019 Drugs / Ethics

Drug companies lure Mexicans across the border to donate plasma

Thousands of Mexicans cross in the US on temporary visas to sell their blood plasma to profit-making pharmaceutical companies promising them hefty cash rewards.

October 3, 2019 Ethics / Hospitals

Hospital Kept Vegetative Patient on Life Support to Boost Survival Rates

Darryl Young suffered brain damage during a heart transplant and never woke up. Doctors kept him alive for a year to avoid federal scrutiny.

August 5, 2019 Ethics / Research / Transplantation

Human-animal hybrids are coming

Human-animal hybrids are coming and could be used to grow organs for transplant. What does it mean? A philosopher weighs in

July 26, 2019 Ethics / Seniors

Webcams in nursing home rooms may deter elder abuse – but are they ethical?

Evidence suggests that ever more people are putting cameras in a relative’s room to detect and deter abuse.

June 18, 2019 Biotechnology / Ethics

Miracle machine can leave patients in limbo

ECMO is designed to be a bridge to somewhere — recovery, transplantation or an implanted heart device. But for some patients it can be “bridge to nowhere.”

June 10, 2019 Ethics

FAQ: How Does New Trump Fetal Tissue Policy Impact Medical Research?

The change was welcomed by abortion opponents, who have long had fetal tissue research in their sights. Many scientists had a very different view.

January 31, 2019 Ethics / Opioids

OxyContin Maker Explored Expansion Into “Attractive” Anti-Addiction Market

Purdue Pharma considered capitalizing on the addiction treatment boom — while going to extreme lengths to boost sales of its controversial opioid.

December 8, 2018 Ethics / Research

Doctors fail to disclose industry ties in journal articles

Industry-sponsored research tends to be more positive than that financed by other sources, that in turn can sway which treatments become available to patients

December 3, 2018 Ethics / Genetics

Go slow, start small with genome screening, experts urge

Programs to screen the genomes of healthy adults to identify genes that may put them at risk for disease later in life need to be implemented with care so that they do not do more harm than good, says an expert panel.

November 27, 2018 Ethics / Genetics

Gene-edited babies: China wants to be the world leader, but at what cost?

This isn’t the first time a Chinese team has used the CRISPR technique on human embryos in a way that few researchers from other countries have attempted.

A group of babies crawling on a white floor

October 16, 2018 Biotechnology / Ethics

Should we edit the genomes of human embryos?

Surveys show that the public are optimistic about genome editing for curing diseases, but there can also be a lack of trust about how this technology will be used.

October 12, 2018 Ethics / Research

Sloan Kettering Cancer Researchers Correct the Record by Revealing Company Ties

Top researchers at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center have filed at least six corrections with medical journals recently, divulging financial relationships with health care companies that they did not previously disclose.