Bioethics in the News

Thanks to the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity for combing through the news and bringing these to the attention of readers:

CHINA OFFICIAL’S MANDATORY ‘TWO CHILDREN’ PROPOSAL DRAWS REBUKE
(Medical Xpress) – China should roll back its one-child policy and instead mandate that all couples have two children, a family planning official has said, drawing criticism Friday from a ruling Communist Party newspaper.   Read More

STEM-CELL TREATMENT BEATS MEDICINE IN SEVERE MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS
(Bloomberg) – Stem-cell transplants were more effective than the standard medicine used to treat people with severe multiple sclerosis, a trial found.   Read More

DYING DUTCH: EUTHANASIA SPREADS ACROSS EUROPE
(Newsweek) – In 2013, according to the latest data, 4,829 people across the country chose to have a doctor end their lives. That’s one in every 28 deaths in the Netherlands.  Read More

CANCER PATIENTS, DOCTOR SUE TO ALLOW PHYSICIAN-ASSISTED DEATH FOR TERMINALLY ILL
(Los Angeles Times) – A group of cancer patients and physicians filed a lawsuit Wednesday to clarify the ability of mentally competent, terminally ill patients in California to obtain prescription drugs from their physician to hasten their death.   Read More

WORLD HAILS UK VOTE ON THREE-PERSON EMBRYOS
(Nature) – Following a February vote in the UK House of Commons, the world may once again look to Britain to push the envelope in fertility treatments, 37 years after IVF was pioneered there.   Read More

Bioethics in the News

Most of these news items are adapted from a list provided weekly by the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity: 

Offsprings' rights: The neglected factor in third-party reproduction. If you read nothing else on the following list, read this powerful piece titled “What Are the Rights ofDonor-Conceived People?” It looks at third-party reproduction from theperspective of a donor-conceived person. (The Public Discourse)

Killer foot cream. 
A common nail fungus drug is eradicating HIV. And the virus isn’tbouncing back when the drug is withheld. So it may not require a lifetime ofuse to keep HIV at bay. This is great news, people! (ScientificAmerican)

Should surrogacy qualify one formaternity leave? An Irishteacher claims she was denied unfairly her paidadoption or maternity leave following the birth of her child via a surrogate.The court was to decide on that one today. (Irish Times)

A brain controls a bionic leg. A team of software and biomedical engineers, neuroscientists,surgeons and prosthetists has designed a prosthetic limb that can reproduce afull repertoire of ambulatory tricks by communicating seamlessly with a humanbrain. (Los AngelesTimes)

SARS doctor pleads for assisted suicide.
The infectious disease doc who helped Toronto through the SARScrisis ten years ago made a video before his death pleading for Canada tolegalize assisted. (The ChronicleHerald)

Number of Dutch killed by physicianassisted suicide rises by 13 per cent.
Voluntaryeuthanasia, where a doctor is present while a patient kills him- or herself (usuallyby drinking a strong barbiturate potion) has been legal in the Netherlands foreleven years. Requests have risen steadily since then. (The Telegraph)

Cancer: More Good news.  National CancerInstitute statistics show that in the U.S. an overall five-year cancer survivalrate for children under 19 with cancer has increased from 62 percent in themid-1970s to 84 percent today. For the most common type of childhood cancer,acute lymphoblastic leukemia, the cure rate is now over 90 percent. Woohoo! (ABC News)

Gene therapy offers hope forpatients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Scientistssay the technique or related ones might also point the way to treatments forother inherited diseases, including Huntington’s. (New York Times)