Editorial on Medical Ethics, Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2021; 12 (1)

With its origin in the Hippocrates Oath (5th-3rd Century BC), The Nuremberg Codes (1947), and The Declaration of Helsinki (1964), medical ethics set the rules of the professional conducts for the physicians and other medical specialists. It amounts to the deployment of bioethical concepts, values (Autonomy, Non-maleficence, Beneficence, and Justice) and methods within medical set up to suggest the day-to-day decision-making procedures by combining theory and practice. It is a multidisciplinary study as it seeks to develop a set of guidelines for moral decision-making utilizing the resources of not only medicine and biology, but also of law, philosophy, theology, and the social sciences. As the branch of Bioethics, it investigates the complex ethical problems which arise for human life and society from sophisticated medical-technological usages and biological practices. The problems specifically include the nature and distribution of treatment and medical resources, the informed consent and authority of the patient, the physician and others involved in the medical practices, the scope and limits of confidentiality, the limits of acceptable intervention and experimentation, and the propriety of research involving humans and their applications. It also deals with the questions of moral dimensions and professional responsibilities involving all forms of ‘life-related’ issues such as research involving foetal tissues, withdrawal of life-sustaining medical treatment, issues over death, prenatal diagnosis and abortion, the storage of frozen embryos. Medical ethics is intricately linked to the culture and glocal values. To emphasise such aspect, the following papers come together to enrich this volume. The first paper entitled Religious, Cultural and Legal Barriers to Organ Donation: The Case of Bangladesh by Farid, M., & Naim Mou, T draws the attention of the readers to the fact that although organ donation can save a great many lives, there is a differential view points of the Bangladeshi Muslim clerics against organ donation. Combined with other cultural and legal issues including the Bangladesh Organ Donation Act (1999, amended in 2018), these differential viewpoints cause major obstacles and reduce the donor pool in the country. The second paper on The Case of Doctor-Patient Relationship in Bangladesh: An Application of Relational Model of Autonomy by Ahmed, T. (2021) proposes that relational model of autonomy better suits the doctor-patient relationship in the context of Bangladesh. Highlighting the potential obstacles for the implementation of such model, the paper reasoned that once the obstacles are worked upon, the relational model has greater scope to work better since it considers keeping “care” as the focal point of the service. The third paper on Understanding of Authorship by the Post Graduate Medical Students at a Center in Bangladesh by Lasker, S., Begum, M., Hossain, A., Matin, M. A., Islam, S., & Macer, D. (2021) studies the understanding of the knowledge, skills and attitude of post graduate medical students on authorship. It highlights a general lack of understanding of the basic concept of authorship ethics among the targeted group. The paper also indicates that the education on authorship of research papers helps in improving the awareness of such concept. The fourth paper on Ethical issues in biomedical research in Nigeria: a systematic review by Ikeagwulonu, C., Uneke, C., & Uchejeso, O. (2021) assesses the various ethical issues that have been associated with biomedical research in Nigeria. The paper identifies that the most common ethical issue that has been widely investigated is the issue of informed consent. The paper also identifies that varying degree of understanding of rights of research subjects exist in the population. As a result, the paper suggests to enhance the capacity of investigators to better understand these issues and also increase their explanatory skill to help participants achieve complete understanding of the rights and various process of the biomedical research in Nigeria. This volume of the journal has also received two short commentaries which added value to the journal through their unique views. The first commentary on COVID-19 Pandemic: Ethical and Medical issues arising for people with disability in Bangladesh by Uddin, T., Mohammad, H. T., & Siddiquee, N. (2021) emphasises that disability rights need to be considered in the inclusive pandemic preparedness and responses. The commentary opines that such comprehensive and ethical pandemic preparedness is essential especially in the developing countries where doctor?patient ratio varies and the country has access to limited medical resources. Else, with enhanced suffering of the particular groups during the pandemic like disaster, the social justice is violated. Hence, pandemic preparedness needs to be ethical and inclusive. The second commentary on Why A New Ethical Framework is Needed to Eliminate Disability Discrimination? A New Learning from The Pandemic by Ranju, G., & Serice, T. (2021) highlights that existing ethical frameworks are unable to address the issues of the fairness and justice especially when the dilemma involves prioritising the rights of the disabled and non?disabled during the pandemic. The commentary recommends the need of new ethics-based research, policy directions, and frameworks to eliminate the discrimination between rights of disable and non-disable people even in hospital admissions during the pandemic. As the guest editor of the issue, I thank all the authors for focusing on the different aspects of medical ethics and selecting the journal, thereby, adding value to the journal through their varied contributions. I convey my heartfelt gratitude to all the reviewers for giving your precious time to review the papers of the issue and also in providing valuable insights and comments for the contributors to strengthen their arguments for the topic. I am also grateful to Professor Shamima Parvin Lasker and Ms. Tahera Ahmed for assigning the role to me for the volume. Finally, I hope readers the papers in the volume would help our readers to think differently to address the ethical issues arising in the domain of the medical ethics.

Thank you, Dr. Rhyddhi Chakraborty FHEA