Contemporary Issues in Bioethics essay

As T. Beauchamp describes, biotechnology research is first of all approached as moral activity, as “whenever our collective wisdom does not prevail over greed or emotion, nature has a way of biting back where it hurts most—if not now, later” (Beauchamp 720). Moral norms and standards create restrictions for scientific discoveries, and it is the task of the society to keep researchers away from ignoring these restrictions. Thus, unbridled enthusiasm of scientists is always counterweighted by practice of physicians. But to keep these contradictions in a system, there should be basic regulatory mechanism in each state to specify the boundaries of biomedical research. Therefore it seems that ethical issues should be controlled and regulated by the representatives of law. It becomes a dilemma whether to let the biotechnology be a self-regulatory system or to leave it for an independent body like judiciary. Otherwise biotechnological dilemmas can be hardly solved, because in each case there are interested parties who cannot stay objective and act for more good of the society on the whole instead of their own success.

However, judicial processes very often take too much time to resolve bioethical difficulties, and such new calamities appear. Besides, it takes a lot of money too and the interpretation of laws is still imperfect. Thorough understanding is needed for lawyers and judges to be really competitive to assist biologists. Consequently, all the hope is put on physicians-scientists who have enough knowledge and experience for leading and encouraging public debates and ultimately taking bioethical decisions. Honest explanation and discussion requires active work of physicians in different directions and contexts, and it goes without saying that such a way includes great expenses. However, these expenses are justified by national reputation and worldly important scientific outcomes.