Do You Have a Moral Obligation To Be Experimented On?

Monday, July 13, 2009
Wesley J. Smith

This article has me queasy. Yes, the writers concede that the moral obligation they seek to establish should not be legally enforceable. Yes, they reject more radical proposals that would require all individuals to sacrifice their individual interests to promote the “greater good.” But still…

Three bioethicists–G. Owen Schaefer, Ezekiel J. Emanuel (Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuael’s brother), and Alan Wertheimer, argue in the JAMA (”The Obligation to Participate in Biomedical Research,”July 1, 2009—Vol 302, No. 1) that we all have a moral “obligation” to “participate in biomedical research.” From the article (no link):

The obligation to participate in biomedical research makes reasonable demands on all individuals in a society. Participating in research is much less burdensome than contributing to many other public goods; joining the army is more risky and time-consuming than any clinical trial that has been approved by a well-functioning institutional review board. Indeed, paying taxes may be much more burdensome than participating in many research trials…the rest