Faculty Bibliography

This paper presents a common standard for conflict of interest disclosure. The common standard was drafted by the authors, following consultation with a multi-disciplinary group of journal editors, publishers, bioethicists and other academics. It is presented here for the benefit of authors, editorial managers, journal editors and peer reviewers to stimulate discussion and to provide guidance to authors in reporting real, apparent and potential conflicts of interest. It is particularly relevant to addiction specialty journals because of the potential conflicts of interest associated with funding from the alcohol, tobacco, pharmaceutical and gambling industries. Following an appropriate period of vetting the common standard within the scientific community, it is recommended that journal editors adopt journal policies and reporting procedures that are consistent across journals.

Vaccination policy in the case of human papillomavirus (HPV) has remained a constant source of controversy ever since Gardasil, Merck's vaccine against HPV, received US Food and Drug Administration approval in the summer of 2006. This controversy has centered on the risks and benefits of vaccinating girls and women in rich and poor nations alike. However, despite all of the attention created by this important policy question, relatively little has been focused on another key public health question: should boys be vaccinated against HPV as well? If herd immunity against the most carcinogenic strains of HPV could be more rapidly and efficiently achieved by vaccinating everyone at risk for being a carrier, it logically follows that vaccine policy should expand to include boys and men.

Green is so distracted by the pace of science in genomics, stem cell research, gene therapy, and preimplantation genetic diagnosis that the staggering plight of so many existing children never edges into his analytical field of vision

Caplan comments on the research regarding the ethical controversy of the embryo research. Commentators have warned that this experiment is the first step toward designer babies and eventually the widespread use of genetic engineering of children to achieve eugenic goals. However, doing such experiment should be done with the approval of a governmental regulatory agency that operates in a transparent, public manner

Caplan talks about the prospect of human cloning, which has now inched very close to becoming a reality. People do not need politicians to panic or religious leaders to decompensate. Instead, they need sound public policies that will prevent the premature use of reproductive cloning, while opening the door to the use of cloning for stem cell research

Nanoethics: The Ethical and Social Implications of Nanotechnology, edited by Fritz Allhoff, Patrick Lin, James Moor, and John Weckert, is reviewed

An effective treatment for syphilis, penicillin, was well established by the late 1940s, but the notorious Tuskegee study continued for 30 more years fuelled by a powerful current of racism until the whole sordid tale was presented to Congress at a series of hearings held by a young Senator Edward Kennedy, in 1973 And a few see bioethics as having its roots far back in the medical ethics thinking done in earlier centuries by such giants as Robert Koch, Claude Bernard, or Moshe ben Maimon (Maimonides). When your specialty is ready for a handbook it has truly arrived. 34 scholars have penned 30 essays on a wide range of subjects-as various as "the rule of double effect", "the ethics of a two-tier health system", "the ethics of enhancement of human beings", and the "politics and policy issues raised by therapeutic cloning"