New book chronicles history of British bioethics
First in-depth study of how bioethicists shaped policyWhile contemporary bioethics took shape in the United States, parallel developments in Britain have been extremely important in...
Interview with Julian Savulescu
Twitter has just expanded its character limit from 140 to 10,000 for direct messages. Yay . However, this is only for DMs, not for public tweets ....
Interview: Julian Savulescu, editor of JME
The editor of the Journal of Medical Ethics discusses the fraught job of editing a leading journal. Julian Savulescu / photo copyright John Robertson Julian...
V is for victory for pink Viagra
This week the FDA approved the controversial drug Addyi, aka "pink Viagra". This wonder drug is supposed to be a treatment for a condition whose...
FDA approves “pink Viagra” for women
But is “hypoactive sexual desire disorder” a real condition, or marketing hype? Nearly 20 years after approving Viagra, the US Food and Drug Administration has...
India’s Jains outraged at ban on ritual suicide
A court has declared a sacred practice unconstitutional. While Western countries wrangle about rational suicide, India is debating spiritual suicide. The High Court of the...
Planned Parenthood in media crisis
Revelations about its foetal tissue sales have opened it to attacks from politicians. Much to its chagrin, Planned Parenthood is still in the headlines of...
Splurging on euthanasia
Apologies! Apologies! Nearly everything in this week's newsletter revolves around euthanasia. It was not planned that way; it just happened. However, some important new data...
Israeli doctors refuse to feed hunger-striker
A Palestinian activist is near death, placing the Israeli government in a quandary. Bioethics intersects with national security in Israel. An imprisoned Palestinian lawyer, Mohammad...
Progressive US bioethicist warns of euthanasia slippery slope
Data from Belgium and the Netherlands are alarming, says Art Caplan “Of all the arguments against voluntary euthanasia, the most influential is the ‘slippery slope’:...
Mixed signals from Netherlands and Belgium about euthanasia
One in 20 deaths in Flanders is from euthanasia There is good news and bad news about euthanasia from the Netherlands and Belgium in JAMA...
Peter Singer debates Sydney Archbishop
Civil but sharp-edged. If you can bear the bizarre squealing sounds at some moments in this video, it makes interesting viewing. It is a public...