1. Introduction to
Bioethicss

2. Objectives:
• Define ETHICS & Bioethics
• Trace the birth and
development of Bioethics

3. Outline
•Definition of Ethics
•Definition of
Bioethics
•Rationale in the study
of Bioethics
•Birth of Bioethics

4. What is Ethics?
• Greek word “ethos” – behavior
or custom that is permanent –
”ethics”
• Latin’s “mos” or “moris” –
“morals”
• Basic human behaviors that are
specific & inherent to human
beings
• Natural to human which
confers and develops goodness
in them

5. What is Ethics?
• A sense of right & wrong from
which human actions proceeds
• Study of the morality of the
human act (Moral philosophy)
• Guides both speculative &
practical intellect in the
acquisition of ethical principles
in concrete human conduct

6. What is Ethics?
• ETHICS is the rational
inquiry into what
constitutes human
happiness in the light of
human nature as reflected
in human conduct
empirically and
emphatically observed.

7. What is Ethics?
•Ethics- study of the end
of man and of human
acts insofar as they are
related to that end.

8. Outline
•Definition of Ethics
•Definition of Bioethics
•Rationale in the study
of Bioethics
•Birth of Bioethics

9. What is BIOETHICS?
• “ethics of life” or of life science
• Health care ethics, medical
ethics or life ethics
• Application of the basic
principles of ethics to the new
possibilities opened by modern
biology & biotechnology with
regard to human life
• Professional ethics in allied
health
» Manlangit

10. What is BIOETHICS?
• Study of human actions of
allied health professionals
with regards to human life
and towards the patient

11. Rationale in the study of
Bioethics
• To address the perennial ethical
problems, issues, dilemmas
confronting health workers
• To address legal problems in health
care with ethical concerns
• To address the challenge of the
modern technology
• To address & enhance professional
development & ethical values of the
health professionals

12. Outline
•Definition of Ethics
•Definition of Bioethics
•Rationale in the study
of Bioethics
•Birth of Bioethics

13. BIRTH OF BIOETHICS

14. History of Bioethics
•Historical Code
•Research Ethics
•Clinical Ethics
•Emerging technology

15. Historical Codes
–Greek Philosophers
• personhood & virtues
behavior
– Hippocrates (5th cent.
B.C.)
• Hippocratic Oath –
“first do no harm”

16. Historical Codes
• Oath of Maimonides (1200)
– Look upon the sick with
empathy & respect
– Accept teaching of elders with
med skills
– Work for the benefit of the
mankind

17. Historical Codes
•Percival’s Code 1794
– 1st code of medical ethics adopted by
group of professional physicians
•American Medical Association
Code
– Duties & obligations of physician to
pts & to the society & the field of
medicine

18. Hippocratic Oath (400 BC)
“DO NO HARM”
•“and abstain from whatever in
deleterious & mischievous. I will
give no deadly medicine to any
one if asked, nor suggest any such
counsel; & in like manner I will
not give to woman a pessary to
produce abortion.”

19. THE TURNING POINT:
•The medical profession had
confront new questions,
raised directly as a result of
extraordinary progress
being made in biomedical
sciences.

20. Research Ethics:
• Nazi Experiments. 1940s
• Tuskegee Syphilis
Experiment (1930 – 1970)
• Jewish Chronic Disease
Study (1963)
• Willobrook Hepatitis Study
(1963 – 1966) – New York

21. Research Ethics:
Nazi Experimentation 1940’s
• Nazi Doctors’ horrific
experimentation on death
camp prisoners
• THE NUREMBERG CODE
– Recognizes the subject

22. Research Ethics:
Tuskegee Syphilis
Experiment (1930 – 1970’s)
• 400 Syphilitic black men in
Alabama (1947)
• Denied of tx even after
penicillin was introduced
in 1947

23. Research Ethics:
• Jewish Chronic Disease
Study (1963)
– Tumor cells were injected into
elderly patients w/o permission
• Willobrook Hepatitis Study
(1963 – 1966) – New York
– Mentally disable children were
intentionally infected with
hepatitis.

24. Research Ethics
• NATIONAL RESEACH ACT
1974
• National Commission for the
Protection of Human Subject
of Biomedical & Behavioral
Research

25. BELMONT REPORT 1979
• 3 fundamental principles of
biomedical research ethics
• Respect for persons
• Beneficence
• Justice
• Importance of INFORMED
CONSENT

26. Ethical Concerns From
Research
• Artificial heart transplantation
– (1960) Dr. Denton Cooley’s
artificial heart -- w/o proper
ethical & regulatory overview
– 1980: Dr. Copeland – quality of
life
• Xenotransplantation – non
human to human

27. CLINICAL ETHICAL
ISSUES
• 1960: Kidney Dialysis machine:
“God Squad” – based from
value – laden, social worth
• New definition of Death by Ad
Hoc Committee at Harvard
University 1968

28. CLINICAL ETHICAL
ISSUES
• Discussion of Demographic
Explosion
• Contraceptive pill by Gregory
Pinkus
• Human Vitae 1968

29. CLINICAL ETHICAL
ISSUES
• Dramatic Shift to civil liberties
and individual rights (1960 &
1970s)
• Women demanded greater
Privacy in Reproductive Decisions
• Patients demanded control over
their treatment decisions

30. CLINICAL ETHICAL
ISSUES
• Dramatic Shift to civil liberties and
individual rights (1960 & 1970s)
• Women demanded greater Privacy
in reproductive Decisions
• Patients demanded control over
their treatment decisions
• Artificial Reproductive technology

31. CLINICAL ETHICAL
ISSUES
• End of Life Issues:
• Patient Self Determination Act of
1991
• Advance directives & living will
• Right to Die Movement
• Oregon Death Dignity

32. History of Bioethics
•Historical Code
•Research Ethics
•Clinical Ethics
•Emerging technology

33. QUESTION:
•Which moral criteria
must be applied in
order to clarify the
problems posed
today in the field of
biomedicine?

34. IS IT?

35. QUESTION:
•Which moral criteria
must be applied in
order to clarify the
problems posed
today in the field of
biomedicine?

36. ANSWER:
Anthropological Vision
•The answer to this
question presupposes a
proper idea of the nature
of the human person in his
bodily dimension.

37. Criteria to Judge Our Ethical
Choices
• Need to be founded in an
anthropology that contains
the objective truth about
man… nature of the
person… of his or her
truth….
• WHAT AND WHO IS THE
PERSON!

38. Outline
•Definition of Ethics
•Definition of Bioethics
•Rationale in the study
of Bioethics
•Birth of Bioethics