scholarly journals The Ethics of Tobacco Harm Reduction: An Analysis of E-Cigarette Availability From the Perspectives of Utilitarianism, Bioethics, and Public Health Ethics

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Thomas ◽  
Lisa S Parker ◽  
Saul Shiffman
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Harm Reduction ◽  
Biomedical Ethics ◽  
Public Health Ethics ◽  
Individual Autonomy ◽  
Tobacco Harm Reduction ◽  
Reduction Strategy ◽  
Ethics Framework ◽  
Health Ethics ◽  
Harm Reduction Strategy

Abstract Much evidence suggests e-cigarettes are substantially less harmful than combustible cigarettes. Assuming this is true, we analyze the ethical case for a policy of e-cigarette availability (ECA) as a tobacco harm reduction strategy. ECA involves making e-cigarettes available to allow smokers to switch to them, and informing smokers of the lower risks of e-cigarettes vis-à-vis smoking. After suggesting that utilitarian/consequentialist considerations do not provide an adequate ethical analysis, we analyze ECA using two other ethical frameworks. First, ECA is supported by a public health ethics framework. ECA is a population-level intervention consistent with respecting individual autonomy by using the least restrictive means to accomplish public health goals, and it supports equity and justice. Second, ECA is supported by four principles that form a biomedical ethics framework. By reducing smokers’ health risks and not harming them, ECA fulfills principles of beneficence and non-maleficence. Because ECA allows smokers to make informed health decisions for themselves, it fulfills the principle requiring respect for persons and their autonomy. Here, we consider whether nicotine addiction and thus ECA undermine autonomy, and also discuss the ethical warrant for special protections for youth. Finally, ECA can also advance justice by providing a harm reduction alternative for disadvantaged groups that disproportionately bear the devastating consequences of smoking. Policies of differential taxation of cigarettes and e-cigarettes can facilitate adoption of less harmful alternatives by those economically disadvantaged. We conclude that public health and biomedical ethics frameworks are mutually reinforcing and supportive of ECA as a tobacco harm reduction strategy. Implications Making e-cigarettes and information about them available is supported as ethical from multiple ethical perspectives.

An Overview of Ethics and Environmental Health

2019 ◽  
pp. 697-703
Author(s):  
David B. Resnik
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Environmental Health ◽  
Environmental Ethics ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Biomedical Ethics ◽  
Public Health Ethics ◽  
Social Utility ◽  
Toxic Substances ◽  
Health Ethics ◽  
Wide Range

This chapter provides an overview of the ethics of environmental health, and it introduces five chapters in the related section of The Oxford Handbook of Public Health Ethics. A wide range of ethical issues arises in managing the relationship between human health and the environment, including regulation of toxic substances, air and water pollution, waste management, agriculture, the built environment, occupational health, energy production and use, environmental justice, population control, and climate change. The values at stake in environmental health ethics include those usually mentioned in ethical debates in biomedicine and public health, such as autonomy, social utility, and justice, as well as values that address environmental concerns, such as animal welfare, stewardship of biological resources, and sustainability. Environmental health ethics, therefore, stands at the crossroads of several disciplines, including public health ethics, environmental ethics, biomedical ethics, and business ethics.

scholarly journals Public Health Implications of Smokeless Tobacco Use as a Harm Reduction Strategy

2006 ◽  
Vol 96 (11) ◽  
pp. 1934-1939 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Savitz ◽  
Roger E. Meyer ◽  
Jason M. Tanzer ◽  
Sidney S. Mirvish ◽  
Freddi Lewin
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Harm Reduction ◽  
Tobacco Use ◽  
Smokeless Tobacco ◽  
Reduction Strategy ◽  
Health Implications ◽  
Harm Reduction Strategy ◽  
Smokeless Tobacco Use

scholarly journals Transparency, trust, and community welfare: towards a precision public health ethics framework for the genomics era

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric T. Juengst ◽  
Annelies Van Rie
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Paradigm Shift ◽  
Public Health Ethics ◽  
Ethical Framework ◽  
Infectious Disease Control ◽  
Ethics Framework ◽  
Health Ethics ◽  
Precision Public Health ◽  
Sequencing Technologies ◽  
Genomics Research

AbstractInfectious disease control is experiencing a paradigm shift, as pathogen sequencing technologies and digital applications are increasingly implemented for control of diseases such as tuberculosis, Ebola, and COVID-19. A new ethical framework should be a critical part of this emerging paradigm to ensure that the benefit of precision public health interventions based on advances in genomics research is not outweighed by the risks they pose to individuals, families, and vulnerable segments of the population. We suggest that the ethical framework guiding practice in this domain combines standard precepts from public health ethics with emerging ethics principles from precision medicine.

scholarly journals Solidarity as a Regulatory Principle for Digital Technologies Used in the Pandemic Response (Preprint)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Junhewk Kim ◽  
Eun Kyung Choi
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Social Trust ◽  
Digital Technologies ◽  
Biomedical Ethics ◽  
Public Health Ethics ◽  
Epidemiological Methods ◽  
Technology Application ◽  
Health Ethics ◽  
Regulatory Principle ◽  
Pandemic Response

UNSTRUCTURED In addition to existing epidemiological methods, the on-going COVID-19 pandemic requires effective approaches for controlling the disease spread. The use of digital technologies has been discussed in this context, and digital contact tracing technology (DCTT) and vaccine passport are representative examples of such technologies. Ethical discussions on the application of these technologies have noted privacy breach and undermining social trust as concerns, arguing that these two aspects should be balanced with the public benefits of technology application. Discussions of digital technologies, including DCTT, as a pandemic response have called for a new perspective on existing public health ethics. This viewpoint paper proposes that applying solidarity as a regulatory principle to digital technologies can offer ways to pursue privacy and public interest as complementary instead of competitive values. Existing studies and discussions of digital technologies in the COVID-19 context were explored, particularly those focusing on the utilization and ethical aspects of DCTT. The development of solidarity in biomedical ethics and its application to public health ethics were also considered. The conclusion was reached that the acceptability of DCTT can increase when privacy is secured, which results in increased overall effectiveness of the technology. This can be achieved by applying solidarity as a regulatory principle, which requires individuals to participate, while empowering the privacy and social trust of participating individuals at the national level. Thus, this paper presents an ethical approach based on the principle of solidarity that reciprocates the interests of individuals and the collective instead of making them compete. This approach is expected to pave the way for an extended framework for both the pandemic response and digital approaches in public health that empower privacy and social trust.

scholarly journals Applying a Public Health Ethics Framework to Consider Scaled-Up Verbal Autopsy and Verbal Autopsy with Immediate Disclosure of Cause of Death in Rural Nepal

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 293-310
Author(s):  
Joanna Morrison ◽  
Edward Fottrell ◽  
Bharat Budhatokhi ◽  
Jon Bird ◽  
Machhindra Basnet ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Cause Of Death ◽  
Verbal Autopsy ◽  
Public Health Ethics ◽  
Ethics Framework ◽  
Health Ethics ◽  
Rural Nepal

scholarly journals Using a Public Health Ethics Framework to Unpick Discrimination in COVID-19 Responses

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (7) ◽  
pp. 114-116 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Yat-Nork Chung ◽  
Alexandre Erler ◽  
Hon-Lam Li ◽  
Derrick Au
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Public Health Ethics ◽  
Ethics Framework ◽  
Health Ethics
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