Find information on topics in health care and biotechnology ethics, including end-of-life care, clinical ethics, pandemics, culturally competent care, vulnerable patient populations, organ transplantation, and other topics in bioethics. (For permission to reprint articles, submit requests to ethics@scu.edu.)
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Police are routinely dispatched to mental health crises, yet these encounters disproportionately result in harm for individuals of color, a pattern long highlighted by racial justice movements like Black Lives Matter. This predictable pattern exposes a deeper ethical tension: can a system grounded in enforcement defend a model that endangers those it is meant to protect?
Explainability techniques seek to remedy the “black box” problem of AI. This piece argues that they are ethically insufficient in a health care context, and that interpretable and rigorously validated models should be used instead.
The United States health care system has undervalued primary care for the last thirty years, which has directly disincentivized physicians from entering primary care and has led to severe access inequalities.
Endometriosis affects 1 in ten women, yet the average diagnosis takes 7–12 years. This diagnostic delay is not a medical mystery–it is a credibility crisis rooted in systemic gender bias in medicine. Accountability is a scientific obligation and an overdue legislative call to action.
Immigration enforcement in and around hospitals threatens trust, decreases quality, disrupts health care delivery, and places clinicians in morally impossible positions. This piece argues for concrete, legal hospital policies that protect patient safety, privacy, rights, and staff integrity.
Pulse oximeters are essential tools for triage and treatment, yet they are significantly more likely to miss dangerously low oxygen levels in patients with darker skin. This discrepancy raises a fundamental ethical challenge: can a health care system justify a foreseeable and preventable distribution of harm in the name of population-level efficiency?
Building an ethical business from day one can be a strategic advantage that attracts partners, talent and investors who care about long-term impact.
Pharmacy closures are a public health emergency in slow motion.
We know that ethics is not just a moral imperative. It is a business strategy.
- A Study in Health Care Ethics
Tianyu Tan, biology major, highlights facts about the Rabies virus and exploring ethical issues regarding diagnosis, access, and the high cost of obtaining necessary rabies treatments.