Bioethics Forum Essay
Overcoming Covid Vaccine Hesitancy Among Minnesota’s Somali Muslims
When Covid-19 vaccines first became available last year, Somali Muslims in Minnesota--the largest Somali Muslim population in North America-- were fearful and, consequently, their vaccination rate was low and their Covid-19 rate was high. But health professionals and community representatives worked together to understand and overcome their vaccine hesitancy.Read “Overcoming Covid Vaccine Hesitancy Among Minnesota’s Somali Muslims”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Covid-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in Rural Communities? Checking Our Assumptions
As access to vaccines increases, the popular press reports waning demand for vaccines in rural residents and points to vaccine hesitancy. But there may be other reasons why doses distributed to rural areas remain unclaimed.Read “Covid-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in Rural Communities? Checking Our Assumptions”
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Transcript | Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity
A HASTINGS CENTER CONVERSATION WITH RHEA BOYD, MAYA GOLDENBERG, AND MILDRED SOLOMON The Hastings Center hosted “Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity,” an online discussion of the ethical issues related...Read “Transcript | Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity”
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Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity
If the United States is to achieve herd immunity, at least 75-85% of the population will need to be vaccinated, yet there are many different kinds of barriers to overcome....Read “Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity”
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Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity
If the United States is to achieve herd immunity, at least 75-85% of the population will need to be vaccinated, yet there are many different kinds of barriers to overcome....Read “Vaccine Access, Vaccine Hesitancy: Challenges to Herd Immunity”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Vaccine Hesitancy Is No Excuse for Systemic Racism
Fewer vaccines are going to Black people. While it’s easy to fall back on vaccine hesitancy as an excuse, systemic racism is to blame.Bioethics Forum Essay
Studying Covid Vaccines in the Youngest Kids
Children have suffered both physical and mental illness during the pandemic. Nearly 200 children in the United States have died. Acute mental health crises increased during the pandemic. Getting children immunized is the best way to get back to normal. We suggest an option that would permit children under 5 to be vaccinated without waiting until traditional prospective randomized trials can be completed.Page
Vaccine Mandates and Passports: Are They Legal and Ethical?
HASTINGS CONVERSATIONS: A SERIES Although roughly 60% of adults in the United States have had at least one Covid vaccine shot, many Americans remain reluctant, or outright opposed, to getting...Read “Vaccine Mandates and Passports: Are They Legal and Ethical?”
Hastings Center News
New Guidance Released for Covid-19 Vaccine Allocation
The Hastings Center released new guidance for local public health authorities and health care systems to help ensure equitable and effective prioritization of Covid-19 vaccine access, based on risk factors, in the months ahead.Read “New Guidance Released for Covid-19 Vaccine Allocation”
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Ethical Challenges in the Middle Tier of Covid-19 Vaccine Allocation: Guidance for Organizational Decision-Making
Download PDF Nancy Berlinger, PhD; Matthew Wynia, MD, MPH; Tia Powell, MD; Aimee Milliken, RN, PhD, HEC-C; Parinda Khatri, PhD; Fatma Marouf, JD, MPH; Keisha Ray, PhD; Johanna Crane, PhD...Page
New Guidance for Middle-Tier Covid-19 Vaccine Allocation Focuses on Equity and Effectiveness in Reaching High-Risk Populations
PRESS RELEASE Contact: Susan Gilbert For Immediate Release 1-845-424-4040, ext. 244 communications@thehastingscenter.org New Guidance for Middle-Tier Covid-19 Vaccine Allocation Focuses on Equity and Effectiveness in Reaching High-Risk Populations Ethical Considerations...Bioethics Forum Essay
Prioritizing the “1a”: Ethically Allocating Scarce Covid Vaccines to Health Care Workers
Beginning this week, guarded vehicles loaded with the first Covid-19 vaccine authorized in the United States are fanning out to hospitals across the country. In vaccine prioritization protocols health care workers, along with nursing home residents, make up phase “1a” – those who are first in line to be vaccinated. While much attention has been paid to who should come next, less is known about how hospitals are allocating vaccine doses among their staff. For many medical centers, the first shipments will only be enough to vaccinate a fraction of their workers. Who goes first within the “1a” category, and how are such decisions made?Read “Prioritizing the “1a”: Ethically Allocating Scarce Covid Vaccines to Health Care Workers”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Islamic Ethics, Covid-19 Vaccination, and the Concept of Harm
Vaccine hesitancy is a concern around the world, but negative attitudes among Muslims in particular toward some coronavirus vaccines have been the focus of attention in the media. Some scholars in Asia recently issued fatwa against the Chinese Covid-19 vaccine. Media coverage has characterized the Muslim world as a hotspot for vaccine hesitancy, but experts point out biases in this coverage and explain the underlying reasons.Read “Islamic Ethics, Covid-19 Vaccination, and the Concept of Harm”
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Bioethics and Racism
Selected resources from The Hastings Center. Bioethics Briefings: Racism and Health Equity Racism threatens health equity by withholding resources people need for proper health based on morally arbitrary features like...Page
Ethics and Public Health
Selected resources from The Hastings Center. Bioethics Briefings: Public Health Ethics and Law Public health encompasses what society does to assure the conditions that are necessary for its members to...Page
TRANSCRIPT: Anti-Black Racism, Health & Health Care
This transcript was generated by computer and may contain errors. Aashna Lal, The Hastings Center Thank you all for joining us today. Welcome to anti-black racism, health and health care....Page
Webinars
Below is a list of webinars hosted by The Hastings Center for Bioethics: Testing Embryos: How Far Should We Go? In Science We Trust? Can AI Promote Our Health &...Bioethics Forum Essay
Should Covid Vaccination Status Be Used to Make Triage Decisions?
As the Covid-19 pandemic continues to strain health systems’ capacity to provide adequate care for critically ill patients, should patients’ vaccination status be considered in making triage decisions? This question sparked debate recently after the leak of an internal memo of the North Texas Mass Critical Care Guideline Task Force that proposed using patients’ Covid-19 vaccination status as a factor to assign intensive care beds.Read “Should Covid Vaccination Status Be Used to Make Triage Decisions?”
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Should the FDA Have Approved the New Alzheimer’s Drug?
Should Patients Take It? Monday, July 12, 2021 The Food and Drug Administration’s accelerated approval of a new Alzheimer’s drug has created a firestorm of praise and outrage. Dissenters include...Read “Should the FDA Have Approved the New Alzheimer’s Drug?”
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Hastings Conversations: Our Series
In 2020, The Hastings Center produced two Hastings Conversations series, Reopening the Nation, in response to the Covid-19 epidemic, and Securing Health in a Troubled Time, in response to racial...Bioethics Forum Essay
Undocumented Immigrants and Covid-19 Vaccination
Willingness to be vaccinated is not the only factor that may reduce vaccination rates. Fear is a powerful deterrent for individuals in hidden populations, especially undocumented immigrants. Even if their work or other circumstances place them at high risk of infection, many would be unlikely to risk the consequences of coming forward to be vaccinated.DEMOCRACY IN CRISIS
Democracy in Crisis: Civic Learning and the Reconstruction of Common Purpose
Introduction: Civic Learning for a Democracy in Crisis By Bruce Jennings, Michael K. Gusmano, Gregory E. Kaebnick, Carolyn Neuhaus, and Mildred Z. Solomon This multiauthored report offers wide-ranging assessments of...Read “Democracy in Crisis: Civic Learning and the Reconstruction of Common Purpose”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Science in the Biden White House: Eric Lander, Alondra Nelson, and the Legacy of Lewis Thomas
Science has replaced populism in the White House. For the first time, the president's science advisor will be elevated to cabinet rank. There are other good omens, as well.Read “Science in the Biden White House: Eric Lander, Alondra Nelson, and the Legacy of Lewis Thomas”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Ashamed to Be Vaccinated? The Ethics of Health Care Employees Forgoing Unfair Priority
Suppose you are young, healthy, employed in a health care system and that your line of work does not require leaving the low-risk comfort of your home. Now suppose that your employer offers you a vaccine. You know there are others in your community who are at greater risk of contracting and dying from Covid-19 than you. Should you accept the dose?Read “Ashamed to Be Vaccinated? The Ethics of Health Care Employees Forgoing Unfair Priority”
COVID-19
Could the Common Cold Help Stop Covid-19? We Need to Know–Now.
In an essay published in Scientific American, we call for immediate and intensive research into the possibility that exposure to one of the coronaviruses that cause the common cold could decrease the severity of Covid-19, and could be leveraged to expand what’s been called “pre-existing” immunity to the disease by deliberate transmission of common cold coronaviruses. Here, we expand on our proposal.Read “Could the Common Cold Help Stop Covid-19? We Need to Know–Now.”
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Securing Health in a Troubled Time
Forty million people live in poverty in the United States, a reality at odds with our great wealth and espoused principles. Health inequities, including dramatically decreased life expectancies and severe...COVID-19 RESOURCES
Ethics Guidance and Resources on Covid-19
As communities across the world work to navigate the pandemic, The Hastings Center has assembled ethics resources for responding to novel coronavirus Covid-19. We are updating this hub throughout the...Bioethics Forum Essay
The Common Good and the Contagion: Florida’s Un-American Experiment
In my family, we know why avoiding infectious disease is important, but my father’s home state of Florida has taken a different approach: Florida’s Surgeon General wants to remove vaccine mandates for children and adults.Read “The Common Good and the Contagion: Florida’s Un-American Experiment”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Covid is Surging. Most Young Children Are Still Unvaccinated
Children are returning to classrooms amid another wave of Covid cases, but some public health leaders have leaned into the message that “most of us” can ignore the continued presence of Covid by taking just “a few basic steps,” such as staying up to date with vaccinations. “Most of us,” however, does not include families with young babies, among other groups for whom these steps are unavailable or insufficient.Read “Covid is Surging. Most Young Children Are Still Unvaccinated”
Bioethics Forum Essay
We Have Met the Enemy and It Is Us
In its early days, bioethics emphasized patient autonomy in the doctor-patient relationship. But patient autonomy is not the be-all and end-all principle to follow in all health care settings. Especially in lethal, airborne infectious disease pandemics.Page
Delivering in Another Tumultuous Year
In 2021, as the country scrambled to decide how to allocate the Covid-19 vaccine, Hastings Center research scholar Nancy Berlinger led a national team to produce detailed guidance on vaccine ethics....Page
2021 Center Highlights
In 2021, as the country scrambled to decide how to allocate the Covid-19 vaccine, Hastings Center research scholar Nancy Berlinger led a national team to produce detailed guidance on vaccine...Bioethics Forum Essay
Exhortations to Trust Biomedical Experts: What’s Missing?
Disagreements among biomedical experts regarding whether the scientific evidence supports delaying the second shot of Covid-19 vaccines or pausing the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines because of very rare side effects bring to the fore missing aspects in exhortations to trust biomedical experts.Read “Exhortations to Trust Biomedical Experts: What’s Missing?”
Bioethics Forum Essay
Covid-19 Vaccination Certificates: Prospects and Problems
Now, with limited distribution of vaccines with varying degrees of efficacy there is renewed interest in immunity passports; more accurately described as vaccination certificates. What remains to be determined is who may use this documentation for what purpose.Read “Covid-19 Vaccination Certificates: Prospects and Problems”
