The Road to Ethics

Richard J B Willis

BUC Health Ministries Director

Clearly there is a credibility gap. People everywhere doubt the words of their politicians, and question some of the technological achievements from the fairly recent past. A number of scientific journals have featured items in which reasons are cited for not believing that man has ever set foot on the moon!

On the other hand, it seems that a large proportion of the public are gullible to the extreme. As an experiment, a man created a web-page describing the encapsulation of homoeopathic quantities of substances in crystals as they formed in caves over many years. He then contacted a sceptic organisation and, using an alias, asked them if such a thing could happen. They replied, giving him scientific reason as to how and why these crystals were generated. He contacted them again using his real name and admitted the hoax. They wouldn't believe him and defended their previous statements.

So, some people don't want to believe, others do. Sometimes the public are duped whether they like it or not. A consumer group in the US is committed to exposing such frauds, and they even have the drug companies in their sights. In the year 2000 the US Food and Drug Administration approved a drug to treat irritable bowel syndrome. The clinical trial, published in the Lancet showed that more people taking the drug felt better than those who took placebos. Unfortunately, data shown in the article omitted to show that both of these items worked about the same in the first month. The Consumer group replotted the data which showed no change in the patients using either the drug of the placebo. In the meantime the drug has grossed millions for the company concerned.

Another drug widely used as a 'safe' alternative for non-steroidal anti-inflammatories already has sales of over $3 billion in a single year. What was not published by the company was data on the subsequent six months of use that showed patients had stomach ulcers at the same rate as patients taking the older medications.

The ethical issue has become topical in that a silicon micro-chip has been produced in California that could by-pass damaged parts of the brain, particularly those areas in which decisions are made. If the chip proves to be successful ethicists are asking, 'Would brain implants of the future force some people to remember things they would rather forget?'

The road to ethics, like the road to hell, is paved with good intentions. If, in the case of the implant for example, the decision-making ability is impaired, and if someone can't form new memories, will they be able to give consent to their treatment? The road to ethics is not just another turn off the motorway, but a route that needs careful planning and study.

© The Stanborough Press