This document outlines Dr. Chris Willmott's rationale for teaching ethics to bioscientists. He argues that there is an explosion of new ethical issues in bioscience due to technological advances. Students need to be equipped to explain these issues to others and ethics will be relevant to their future careers. Additionally, quality assurance standards in the UK recommend addressing the ethical and social impacts of bioscience. The document then discusses using case studies, debates, and news clips to teach ethics and introduces several example cases that raise issues around genetic screening, stem cell research, and animal research.

1. FEBS, Prague, July 2009
Different Approaches to
Ethics Teaching
Dr Chris Willmott
Dept of Biochemistry
University of Leicester
cjrw2@le.ac.uk
University of
Leicester
THE University of the Year 2008

2. Why teach ethics to bioscientists?
• Explosion of new issues
“Modern Science has placed in our hands
capabilities that have aggravated long-standing
ethical problems as well as introducing new
quandaries”.
Stanley Grenz (moral philosopher)

3. Why teach ethics to bioscientists?
• Explosion of new issues
• Equipping students to explain key issues to friends
1999 Eurobarometer survey:
“Ordinary tomatoes do not contain genes
while genetically-modified tomatoes do”
35% agreed with the statement
30% “do not know”

4. Why teach ethics to bioscientists?
• Explosion of new issues
• Equipping students to explain key issues to friends
• Relevance to future careers
- research?
- teaching?
- medicine?
- science communication?

5. Why teach ethics to bioscientists?
• Explosion of new issues
• Equipping students to explain key issues to friends
• Relevance to future careers
• It’s interesting

6. Why teach ethics to bioscientists?
• Explosion of new issues
• Equipping students to explain key issues to friends
• Relevance to future careers
• It’s interesting
• In the UK, the QAA says we should
Quality Assurance Agency “Benchmarking statements”
- first edition, 2002
- second edition, 2007
http://tinyurl.com/QAAbioscience07

7. QAA Benchmarking for Bioscience
“Students should expect to be confronted by some
of the scientific, moral and ethical questions
raised by their study discipline, to consider
viewpoints other than their own, and to engage
in critical assessment and intellectual argument”
“Recognising the moral and ethical issues of
investigations and appreciating the need for
ethical standards and professional codes of
conduct”

8. QAA Benchmarking for Bioscience
All students should:
“Have some understanding of ethical issues and
the impact on society of advances in the
biosciences”
Good students should:
“Be able to construct reasoned arguments to
support their position on the ethical and social
impact of advances in the biosciences”

9. Ethical issues for Bioscientists
Can consider issues in three categories:
1. Research integrity
2. Biomedical ethics
3. Environmental bioethics

10. Approaches
• Case studies/ scenarios
• Debate and role-play
• Newspapers
• Book extracts
• TV programmes/Films/News
• Clips to convey information
• Clips as discussion starters
• Student-generated videos

11. Bioethics = Bio- and ethics
• Science – could it be done?
• Ethics – should it be done?
Important that both are being considered:
Science without ethics may be immoral
Ethics without science may be impossible

12. Case studies & scenarios
• Case studies allow real-world framing of
otherwise abstract ideas
• Can have a key role in opening up complex
issues for students
• May be genuine or fictional (though latter work
best when as close to real as possible)

13. Case study (1) – Carl and Julie
Carl is a twenty-one year old builder. He is engaged to Julie,
and she has recently discovered that she is expecting their
first child. In 2001, Carl’s maternal grandfather died from
Huntington’s disease (HD), a late-onset degenerative disease
of the nervous system. HD is inherited in a dominant fashion;
if you do have HD, you have a 50% chance of passing it on to
your children. Carl’s mum has decided not to take the test to
find out if she got the faulty copy from her father, but now
that he is expecting to be a father himself, Carl is keen to find
out if there is any risk that he has passed on the condition.
What are some of the issues at stake for Carl and Julie? What
are the consequences of taking the test, or deciding not to?
If you were Carl, what would you do?

14. Genetic screening
Carl can know his status and prepare accordingly
But his mum has made a conscious decision not to
know, hence potential harm to her
Other consequences:
- Carl’s relationship with Julie?
- Carl’s relationship with baby?
- Implications for Carl’s work?
- Insurance implications, etc
(Developed from episode of “Bitter Inheritance”)

15. Case study (2) – Wendy & Paul
Wendy and Paul Carter have been married for twelve years. They would
love to have children. Unfortunately, Wendy had breast cancer when
she was 28 and although the chemotherapy has brought total
remission from the disease it also caused damage to her ovaries that
has made her infertile.
Paul and Wendy have been on the waiting list at their local IVF clinic for
a number of months awaiting donated eggs to try and have a baby.
At present, however, there are 200 potential mothers seeking each
donated egg and the couple know that realistically they may never
receive a donated egg via the normal channels.
Researchers at the hospital attached to the IVF clinic have recently
gained permission to carry out experimental procedures using eggs
harvested from aborted foetuses. The technique is controversial, but
for Paul and Wendy it may represent their only chance to receive a
donated egg.

16. Case study (2) – Wendy & Paul
What are the issues involved in this case?
- Feel free to include aspects of the case that are
likely to be issues for other people, your
contributions need not be limited to your own
opinions.

17. Case study (2) – Wendy & Paul
• This case
- content is fictional but based on real ideas
and statistics
- used in Session 1 of 6 in bioethics series
- used as vehicle to introduce more
philosophical aspects

18. Case study (2) – example comments
Deontological (first principles, rights, duties)
• Does a foetus have any rights?
• Does the “mother” have any rights or say in the
upbringing of their “grandchild”?
• Should people be allowed to manipulate nature for
their own gain?
Consequentialist (outcomes)
• What would be the psychological effects on the
child?
• If the child turns out to be “defective” then who is
culpable?
• What is the likelihood of success?

19. Vehicle for introducing philosophy
Deontological (first principles, duties)
Consequentialist (outcomes)
Virtue ethics (importance of character)
Principlism

20. Making ethical decisions
Principles of Biomedical Ethics
(Beauchamp & Childress) propose 4 principles:
• Non-maleficence Don’t do harm
• Beneficience Do good, act in the best interests of
others
• Autonomy Maximise freedom for individual or
community
• Justice Treat equal cases equally and unequal
cases differently
Principlism

21. Genetic screening
Carl can know his status and prepare accordingly
(Autonomy, Beneficience)
But his mum has made a conscious decision not to
know, hence potential harm to her
Other consequences:
- Carl’s relationship with Julie?
- Carl’s relationship with baby?
- Implications for Carl’s work?
- Insurance implications, etc
(Adapted from episode from series “Bitter Inheritance”)

22. TV footage – why?
• Familiar visual medium
• Can be used to:
- convey information
- as discussion starters
• Clips save time over full programme

23. What sort of programmes?
• Documentaries, e.g.
- A Child Against All Odds (2006)
- DNA – The Promise & The Price (2008)
- The World’s First Face Transplant (2006)
• Drama e.g.
- Holby City (various, esp 2006)
- The Island (2005)
- Million Dollar Baby (2004)
• News clips
- topical
- pithy summary
- online?

24. Clips to raise issues – GATTACA
GATTACA (Dir: Andrew Niccol, 1997) is set “in the not
too distant future”. Having watched the clip, consider
the following questions:
• How realistic is the genetic screening process shown
in the film? Which aspects can already be done?
Which are likely to be more difficult?
• Screening of this type would be controversial. What
are some of the potential benefits, and what are
some of the potential problems?
• Consider your answers to Q2. What form of ethical
thinking does each represent?
• Does this film offer any insights into current
development in genetic screening?

25. GATTACA – Science issues
Technology shown could offer selection, but not
enhancement – gene can only be included if mum
or dad had it!
Current PGD? Future PGD?
Genetic determinism? How much of us as individuals
is down to our genes and how much down to other
factors (food intake, trauma, etc)?

26. GATTACA – Ethical issues
Genetic discrimination – ‘Valids’ v ‘In-valids’? A ‘made-
man’ v a ‘faith-birth’? A ‘vitro’ v a ‘utero’?
Insurance moratorium in UK (until 2011). Risk and
social exclusion?
What would it be suitable to check for? Diseases?
Gender? Physical features? Character traits?
What costs to the individual and to society are worth
paying in order to select-out diseases?
What do such attitudes say about people with
disabilities now?
Role of genetics in forensics?

27. News clip – structured activity
Therapeutic Cloning
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u re o e w n une th 0 4
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e m
dis us inga a
c s n pplic tio b ate mo s ie tsa Ne c s Unive ity fo
a n y a f c ntis t w a tle rs r
pe is io toc rry o “ ra uticc ning . Re dthro h the eq s ns
rm s n a ut the pe lo ” a ug s ue tio
be reyo s ethec s yo kno wha tolo k o fo
fo u e lip, o u w t o ut r.
From the video
Expla ho the pe
in w ra uticc ningw uldwo
lo o rk
Wha isthes urc o thee g tobeus din thisre e rc
t o e f gs e s a h?
Wha isthes te a o there e rc
t ta d im f s a h?
Thinking deeper
In thec P fe s r Murdo h s ys
lip, ro s o c a :
“Imagine a child, say a ten year old child, now
who is diabetic who’s cells that normally produce
insulin are not working properly, so that child
will have to take insulin injections for the rest of
their life. Possibly, in five or ten years time, we
could be in a situation where we could take a tiny
piece of skin fromthat child, do some work within
the laboratory to tell that skin cell to forget that
it was ever a skin cell, to learn to become a stem
cell, which means that it has no background
information about what it is going to be, and then teach that stemcell to become an insulin secreting
cell so that cell can be planted back into the child and then the diabetes theoretically would be cured.”
Co pa thisw thee
m re ith xpla tio o ho the pe
na n f w ra uticc ningw uldwo
lo o rk;
- in w t wa w sit d re a
ha ys a iffe nt, nd
- in w t wa w sit thes m ?
ha ys a a e
Wha o je tio tos mc ll re e rc a m ntio din thevide ?
t b c ns te e s a h re e ne o
Wha o r re s ns(no m ntio d) m y c us pe pletoo c tothe pe
t the a o t e ne a a e o bje t ra uticc ning
lo ?
Wha te hnic l diffic
t c a ultie m ht m kethiswo diffic toa hie ?
s ig a rk ult c ve

28. Using News stories in Bioscience
• Think of as many ways as possible that you might link one
or more of the following news stories to your teaching of:
(a) basic bioscience and/or
(b) bioethics?
Face transplant Cognitive
GFP Marmosets enhancement?
Images from http://news.bbc.co.uk/

29. GFP Marmosets
Science of
transgenics Ethical questions
What is GFP?
Is it OK to alter
How was the gene
monkeys in this way?
transferred in?
Does the fact that
Why was it transferred in?
alteration was inherited
make any difference?
What is the basis for
animal rights?
Wider debate about animals
Do animals have rights?
Abolitionists
Sentiency?
Welfarists
Justice?
3Rs (refine, reduce, replace)
Utility?
Image from http://web.princeton.edu/sites/ehs/biosafety/animalworker/pics/marmoset.jpg

30. Face transplants
Ethical
Technical Risks v Benefits
Availability of donor face? Motivation?
Functionality of transplant?
Plan B if rejected?
Lifestyle issues
Psychological Media intervention?
Cancer risk?
For patient?
For potential patients?
For wider society? Immunological
Face and identity? Rejection rates?
(30-50% over first 2-5 yrs)
Harmful effects of immunosuppressive drugs?
Image from http://news.bbc.co.uk/

31. Cognitive enhancing drugs?
Science of Arguments in favour
enhancement Autonomy
What drugs are people “if it’s ok for kids it’s ok for
taking? me”
What is the basis of Others get advantage from
their effect? genes or wealth
Legal = know medicine is
what it claims to be
Better productivity =
Therapy v economic benefit
Enhancement
Can a case be made that Arguments against
moving someone from poor
to normal is different from Safety: esp long term use
normal to superior? Fairness: will others need
to take enhancers to
compete
Image from http://freedocere.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/ritalin-sr-20mg-full1.jpg

32. Helpful websites
e.g. www.bioethicsbytes.wordpress.com

33. Helpful websites
e.g. www.bioscience.heacademy.ac.uk/resources/ethicsbrief.htm
Bioethics Briefings
Six titles and
others to follow

34. Helpful websites
e.g. www.beep.ac.uk

35. Helpful websites
e.g. www.at-bristol.org.uk/cz/Default.htm