Euthanasia Story Grips French Media
Mar 24th, 2008 • Posted in: NewsIn other medical-ethics news, a London paper reports on drug trials involving the terminally ill, and a contaminant believed to be responsible for 19 deaths apparently was introduced into a drug component manufactured in China
VARIOUS DATELINES
Wrenching ethics issues were the subjects of medical reports from the world press last week. Among the top stories:
- Euthanasia became a page-one moral issue in France after the death of a woman suffering from a rare, painful, and horribly disfiguring facial tumor. Chantal Sébire ignited a fierce debate over French laws prohibiting assisted suicide when she fought to overturn the prohibition during the final days of her life, reports TIME magazine. She was featured on national television pleading for a painless death rather than the prolonged coma into which she was destined to fall. She was found dead last Thursday night, reports TIME. As this issue of Newsline went to press, the exact cause of her death was not known.
- Drug trials on terminally ill patients in Britain have raised a series of complex legal and ethical issues, reports the London Daily Telegraph. Such testing now involves several steps, including approval for human testing by the government-run Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, which evaluates basic safety criteria, and then approval by another body, the Medical Research Ethics Committee, which evaluates whether the drug’s potential benefits outweigh the risks. But in the case of terminally ill patients, the ethics committee also must be satisfied that the patients are not given unduly high hopes of a “miracle cure,” reports the Telegraph.
- Problems linked to the global reach of the pharmaceutical industry again were in the ethics spotlight as it was confirmed that a blood-thinning drug was contaminated by an ingredient from China. Bloomberg reports that tests showed the contaminant was similar to one of the standard ingredients used in formulating the drug, but had been made from cheaper ingredients and was not approved in the United States for medical use. The drug, called heparin, was withdrawn from the market by the Illinois manufacturer Baxter International. A spokesperson for Baxter said the contaminant was likely introduced “at the workshop or consolidator level” in China, according to the Bloomberg report. As many as 19 people are believed to have died because of the contaminant, according to press reports.
Sources: Guardian, Mar. 23 — Telegraph, Mar. 22 — TIME, Mar. 21 — Bloomberg, Mar. 21 — Reuters, Mar. 20.
For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Mar. 10 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 4 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 20, 2006 — Related Newsline Commentary, July 24, 2006 — Related Newsline story, June 12, 2006.
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