New Zealand bioethics journal最新文献

Encompassed within forecasts offered by proponents of biotechnology about cures and control of disease and disability, are also predictions of an enhanced society. However, if the citizenship of our society is to be 're-membered' in the future with processes of elimination being employed on some potential lives deemed not worth living, deep ethical scrutiny is required. Hence, this discussion contends that when considering ethical decisions impacting upon the membership of future societies, there also exists an imperative to seek insight and wisdom by looking to past actions. The experiences and narratives of many people with disability and their families attest to some of these past actions whereby agendas of elimination have been impaired by practices founded upon both moral and socio-political exclusion. When considering 're-membering' in this context, a deliberation upon the imperative to remember will utilise the proximal text of a conference venue to contend that ethical reflection in this biotechnological era must embrace a process of anamnesis of past practices, rather than the more common approach of amnesia.

In the social sciences, debates about the discursive and material constitution of subjectivity and identity no longer appear to be at loggerheads. This has important implications for how we are to construct a framework for thinking about disability ethics. Following recent inroads in disability theory and in the sociology of ethics, we would argue that one of the aims of a disability ethics is not to view disability exclusively as a question of impairment, but to reclaim the social aspects of impairment in conjunction with the embodied aspects of disability. We would also suggest that the social and cultural construction of impairment, or abnormal corporeality, cannot be considered apart from the moral and existential relations that exist between disabled and non-disabled persons. The question we want to raise in this discussion is whether thinking disability ethics through a bioethics framework is adequate to this task.

In this paper we overview the findings of a literature review that was undertaken to guide the revision of the Guidelines on Ethical Matters in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research (NH&MRC, 1991). The literature reviewed, in general, supported the development of specific research guidelines for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander contexts. The findings of this review were analysed thematically, and a number of key issues were identified for consideration in the review process. We present a summary of these key issues. In the final section of the paper we consider in more detail two of the key issues raised in the review process (the assessment of relevance or benefit of proposed research; and the process of consultation and negotiation of collective consent) in order to critically consider how these issue should be engaged in revised guidelines. On the basis of this analysis, it is our contention that specific guidelines on key issues are limited to the extent to which they can anticipate all possible research contexts. In order to address this problem, and guide researchers, guidelines should also explicitly outline the values, from an Aboriginal and Torres Islander perspective that are foundational to an ethical research process.

Organ transplantation is widely agreed to be beneficial to health. Many transplantations involve donation from the deceased. In Aotearoa/New Zealand, Maori both donate and receive proportionally fewer organs than non-Maori. This paper seeks illumination of this fact in unique Maori spiritual beliefs. These spiritual beliefs are not held by all Maori, and their role in an individual's life may vary, nonetheless they constitute a living tradition. Because cadaveric donation involves removal of organs from the dead person as soon after death as possible, considerations arise about customary rules and observances and the movement between the realm of the living and the dead. This may raise concerns for donors, recipients, and their respective whanau (extended family). In some cases, these concerns may form a consideration against donating posthumously.

From 1986 to 1991 the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council in close consultation with Australian Indigenous organisations embarked on a process of formulating ethical guidelines for the conduct of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health research. These guidelines were drafted under the direction of the National Aboriginal and Islander Health Organisation, reviewed by an NHMRC appointed Aboriginal Working Party, and eventually published--though not formally ratified--as the interim NHMRC Guidelines on Ethical Matters in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research, 1991. This article briefly documents this lengthy and sometimes difficult process, offering an account of the events and actions that led to the release of the 1991 interim guidelines. In doing so, the paper illustrates some of the ways in which the process and politics of 'Western' health research have been debated and confronted within the context of Indigenous/non-Indigenous relations in Australia.