Bioethics panel told no guarantee against unethical research
Rules have not changed behaviour, experts sayThe bioethical abuses of 1940 to 1970 could happen again despite over 1,000 rules and regulations designed to end...
Private labs store baby teeth for stem cells
Private labs offer “biological insurance” Commercial laboratories have moved into marketing tooth stem cells as a kind of health insurance for children. Preserving cord blood is...
Reprogrammed stem cells can have mutations
Adult stem cells may be in some doubt Adult cells that have been reprogrammed into stem cells may harbour genetic mutations, some of them cancerous. In...
Younger patients would get best organs under kidney transplant program
Efforts to “best utilize the gift of the donated organ” The US organ-transplant network may reserve its best kidneys for younger, healthier people over older,...
Another grandmother gives birth to her grandson
In yet another grandmother surrogacy story, a 57-year-old UK woman gave birth to her own grandson after her daughter was medically unable to have a...
Abortion is safer than having a baby, doctors say
Abortion advice raises concerns The UK’s Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists plans to advise women that it is safer to have an abortion than...
Unacceptable death rates end animal cloning trials
Cloning presents significant health risks A leading animal cloning organisation, New Zealand’s AgResearch, has ended cloning trials because of unacceptable death rates. But the science...
Assisted suicide or murder?
Bizarre turn of events leads to second-degree murder chargeIt is clear that Kenneth Minor held the knife that killed Jeffrey Locker. But was it suicide,...
German Medical Association eases assisted suicide regulations
Liberalisation puts focus on consciences of doctorsThe German Medical Association has issued new guidelines for physician-assisted suicide which allow doctors to make conscientious decisions about...
France’s first “saviour sibling” sparks debate about ethics of biotechnology
Boy’s discarded umbilical cord will help heal siblingFrance’s first “saviour sibling” – a healthy boy whose discarded umbilical cord will help his sibling’s genetic blood...
Man sentenced to life in prison says killing daughter was “right thing to do”
Killed his 12-year-old disabled daughterRobert Latimer, the Canadian man sentenced to life in prison for the mercy killing of his severely disabled daughter in 1993,...
Boy, 3, born missing part of his brain, baffles doctors
Boy defies all expectationsA three-year-old boy without a cerebellum has stunned doctors by learning to walk. Chase Britton, 3, born prematurely and legally blind, is...