Is Bioethics Necessary?

Before we begin to answer the question, ‘is it or is it not necessary, we need to ask more questions, relevant questions to unravel the basic knowledge of what exactly is bioethics? We might be familiar with the word and have heard it mentioned in the news or perhaps in some research papers. But how many of us actually “know” what bioethics is? Well, I’m asking because I’m constantly questioned by friends, family and people I meet especially when mentioning my chosen field of research for my doctoral studies. “SO what do you actually research in bioethics? “, is also another common concern.  They ask with such worry that gives you the impression that you are simply wasting your precious time as the outcome is nothing but a pile of rubbish that no one would find use for. I still remember the comment my former boss made when I raised interest to pursue this field for my PhD research.  “Nisha, ethics or bioethics no need to waste time to study, it’s simply a skill you pick up as you conduct research, why don’t you choose a ‘more important’ research like chemistry, biomedical science or others?” I was completely heartbroken to hear my boss, a senior in the workforce feels so niggling about bioethics and to make such a comment that bioethics is not important in comparison with other pure sciences was even more unacceptable.  Then why, is there bioethics?

Bioethics is more of a pursuit to reflectively examine the moral and ethical issues surrounding the research of medical and health sciences. It also helps monitor and regulate proper health care facility and overall maintain a fair public health policy. Bioethics is troubled with issues involving basic human values for example the rights to life and health and also if certain developments in healthcare institutions, life technology and medicine are done properly with the experts involved, performing their duties with moral and without any selfish goals. Lately we are overwhelmed with the amount of research conducted in the name of science and medicine like stem cell, but in the course of finding a cure or treatment for devastating diseases scientists tend to overstep the ethical boundaries of animal and human rights especially when their research and experiments utilizes animals, human embryos or humans as test subjects. Some of these researches might offer the possibility of easing the suffering of patients but without a bioethical committee or review board overlooking the rights of the experimental subjects (this includes patients, test subjects, animal or human and also donors) there is a possibility of breach to the code of ethics where the involved parties’ rights might be violated.  Therefore it is vital for such committee to analyse each and every research, if they are worth conducting without any form of controversies. And by doing so we ensure all the parties are well informed of their rights and the risks involved unless it’s an animal then you need to get the proper bodies to grant consent. There are so many ethical issues we are faced with when we start digging about immoral research such as women treated as commodities for their egg and embryo donations, using human test subjects without attaining the necessary consent, ill-informing these human test subjects of their rights and risks throughout the experiments, the violation of basic rights of the embryos which are destroyed while extracting stem cells, the animals which are used as test subjects which are destroyed in the process of securing data and many others. If there isn’t an ethicist or bioethicist then this type of discrimination would continue and the future of mankind is questionable, as one day our fundamental value would be at stake. SO is bioethics necessary? Yes!!

Bioethics has brought over substantial changes in terms of standards for conducting research, and treatment for the sick. Based on the theories and explanation, healthcare professionals now recognise that patients have the right to know what is being done to them and the choice to refuse if need be. Ultimately every scientists now understands that any participants in their research have the same rights and the review board have the authority to evaluate the proposed research on the same basis and that eventually becomes universal.