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‘Frankenfish’ far less scary than fast food

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By Art Caplan [cross-posted from his NBCNews Vitals column]

Two big events recently took place in the world of food: The Food and Drug Administration decreed that genetically engineered salmon wouldn’t harm the environment and McDonald’s announced that its McRib sandwich is back on the menu.

The FDA’s announcement paves the way for the first approval of a genetically engineered animal for humans to eat – and it was met with a good deal of highly critical wailing and groaning by Consumer’s Union, National Geographic and many other advocacy groups who are wary of genetically engineered food.

The McRib’s return was greeted with a few snickers by late night comedians and overwhelmingly happy faces on the millions of Americans who eat at one of the 13,000 McDonald’s restaurants from Maine to Hawaii every day. This, as my grandmother would have said in Yiddish, is “fakakta”—completely screwy.

If you like salmon, and I do, should you worry much about the safety of eating genetically engineered salmon?  No. The FDA said it could not find any valid scientific reason to prohibit the sale of the fish.

If you like the McRib, and I do, should you worry a lot about eating it?  Oh yeah.

Keep reading…

We Need to Treat Violence as Public Health Issue

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By Art Caplan (cross-posted from his Vitals column on NBCNews)

The mass murder of 20 children and six adults Friday in Newtown, Conn., has provoked yet another round of recrimination, finger pointing and breast-beating. Was the shooter mentally deranged? If there was more gun control, would this have happened? Did violent video games play any role? What we fervently want as we continue to reel from a story whose misery seems to know no bounds is to find a clear cause – a reason why this happened – so that we can fix it.

We hope to see something in all the stories, analyses, commentaries, Facebook postings and Twitter speculation that gives us the reason behind what happened and thus a guarantee that if we understand and act on it then no 6 year old or her parent need to worry ever again what might happen at their school. We hope that no college, hospital or mall will ever again have a reason to practice drills for “shooters” and no play or movie-goer grow anxious over who has snuck into the theater with evil intent.

But, there is no simple answer. We have ourselves to blame for where we find ourselves in terms of mass shootings. Our culture is too far down the road of tolerating and even extolling violence. We do so in our popular entertainment, we permit the mass marketing of violence to young kids, and we thrill to it in too many of our sports. A lot of people make a lot of money selling violence. I doubt that will change.

Read more…

Art Caplan: MA Should Legalize Physician-Assisted Suicide

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Weighing in on Question 2, Massachusetts’ ballot initiative on physician-assisted suicide, Art Caplan says we should vote “yes”:

Mass. should legalize physician-assisted suicide

Of the numerous ballot initiatives that will be decided at the state level on Tuesday, none is more hotly contested than the Massachusetts bill to decide whether to legalize physician-assisted suicide. The citizens of Massachusetts, my home state, should vote to legalize.

The proposed measure allows terminally ill patients to be given access to lethal drugs. A terminally ill patient is defined as someone with six months or less to live. The patient’s terminal diagnosis and mental competency must be attested to by two doctors. Patients would have to make a request to their doctor twice orally and once in writing. The written request would have to be witnessed.

Yet even with such restrictive conditions, opponents of the proposal say doctors should never, as a matter of professional ethics, intentionally hasten the death of one of their patients, even one who is terminally ill. The codes of medicine and nursing ethics reject helping patients die.

Keep reading…

Fixing Genes Using Cloning Techniques

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One more from Art Caplan:

Fixing genes using cloning technique is worth the ethical risk

A team of scientists at the Oregon National Primate Research Center and the Oregon Health & Science University are reporting a remarkable advance in the treatment of inherited genetic disease in the journal Nature.

They show it is possible to repair a tiny part of a human egg cell that, when broken, causes a host of awful inherited genetic diseases.  Those diseases cause disability and the death for many children and adults.  What is equally remarkable is that the treatment they report is illegal in Britain, Germany, Costa Rica, Norway and Sweden and would be illegal to provide using federal dollars in the United States.

What did the Oregon scientists do?  And why is it so ethically controversial?

Keep reading…

Art Caplan on Liability for Non-Vaccinators

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Art Caplan has a new article out in the Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics – “Free to choose but liable for the consequences: should non-vaccinators be penalized for the harm they do?” (subscription required)

Here’s the abstract: Can parents who choose not to vaccinate their children be held legally liable for any harm that results? The state of laboratory and epidemiological understanding of a disease such as measles makes it likely that a persuasive causal link can be established between a decision to not vaccinate, a failure to take appropriate precautions to isolate a non-vaccinated child who may have been exposed to measles from highly vulnerable persons, and a death. This paper argues that, even if a parent chooses to not vaccinate a child under a state law permitting exemptions, that decision does not create complete protection against liability for the adverse consequences of that choice.

Art Caplan: Many needlessly getting steroid injections for back pain

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In his latest MSNBC column, Art Caplan addresses a different angle of the fungal meningitis outbreak:

Many needlessly getting steroid injections for back pain, bioethicist says

The quest for relief from pain has now resulted in the deaths of 19 people and a total of 247 confirmed infections of fungal meningitis from tainted steroid injections. Thousands more who got the injections, made by the New England Compounding Center in Massachusetts, are worried that they too may wind up sick or dead.

The horrific outbreak has resulted in the outrage about a lack of oversight of the compounding pharmacy.

But, this tragedy has another aspect that is not getting sufficient attention. Why are so many Americans getting spinal injections?

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Art Caplan on Grace Lee

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Unfortunately, these stories are like deja vu.  In his most recent MSNBC commentary, Art Caplan emphasizes that we all have the right to refuse medical care, even if others disagree and even if it means death.  Here’s his take:

Opinion: Daughter has right to die against parents’ wishes

When your time comes to die, you probably hope that you will be surrounded by loving family members and friends who will support you and help you leave this earth at peace with one another. Sadly, for 28 year-old SungEun Grace Lee, who is dying in a Long Island hospital, that is not happening.

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Greenpeace Out to Sea on GM Rice Issue

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[posted on behalf of Art Caplan]

Greenpeace, perhaps best known for its battles at sea to protect whales and the oceans, has gotten itself involved in a huge controversy over genetically modified food.

The group is charging that unsuspecting children were put at risk in a “dangerous” study of genetically engineered rice in rural China. It’s a serious claim, because it is putting research seeking to put more nutrition into food at risk.

Genetically engineered rice has the potential to help solve a big nutritional problem—vitamin A deficiency.  A lack of vitamin A kills 670,000 kids under 5 every year and causes 250,000 to 500,000 to go blind. Half die within a year of losing their sight, according to the World Health Organization. I think Greenpeace is being ethically irresponsible and putting those lives at continued risk.

Read the rest over at NBCNews Vitals.

Art Caplan in The Lancet: Death by Refusal to be Turned

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Our blogger Art Caplan has a fascinating new piece in The Lancet today about an elderly patient who refused to be turned in his hospital bed and died from the ensuing bed sores/infection.  Art’s conclusions emphasize both patient autonomy and preserving the ability of health care professionals to provide care in humane and safe conditions.  In the meantime, he asks a number of important questions about this patient’s decision:

Could Harold or any other patient deny care considered basic and standard? If he asked not to be turned could he also demand that the heat be turned off in his room? Could he refuse to let anyone touch him at all? Could a patient demand no elevation of his bed? No taking of vital signs? And without a clear policy about a request not to turn, were the hospital staff exposing themselves to a good deal of bureaucratic and regulatory grief when Harold died?

 and

Harold seems to have been well within his legal rights to refuse turning. But would a hospital or a nursing home be within their rights to refuse him admission if what he wants is well outside the standard of care? Should all health-care institutions have a policy on turning? Although such requests are rare, the turmoil they cause is enormous. Should “not turning” be offered as an option in circumstances akin to those governing the ending of dialysis, ventilator support, resuscitation, and chemotherapy? Should turning be a topic of discussion as part of writing an advanced directive? If so, what support ought to be given to health-care providers involved in a case where a competent patient insists on not being turned?

What do you think?