Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Figures
- About the Editors
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Foreword
- Introduction: Charting a Sustainable Path for the Twenty-First Century Pharmaceutical Industry
- PART I PROFITS, PATIENTS' RIGHTS, AND SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS: THE ETHICS OF CLINICAL RESEARCH CONDUCTED IN PRIVATE ENTERPRISES
- Introduction to Part I
- 1 Drug Research: Between Ethical Demands and Economic Constraints
- 2 Emerging International Norms for Clinical Testing: Good Clinical Trial Practice
- 3 The Regulatory and Ethical Challenges of Pediatric Research
- 4 Including Children in Research: Participation or Exploitation?
- 5 Racial and Ethnic Inclusiveness in Clinical Trials
- 6 The Rights of Patients to Participate in Clinical Research
- 7 How Should Government Regulate Stem-Cell Research? Views from a Scientist-Legislator
- PART II MARKETING AND THE EFFICIENT UTILIZATION OF HEALTHCARE RESOURCES: ETHICAL AND PUBLIC POLICY CHALLENGES
- PART III PATENTS, PRICING, AND EQUAL ACCESS
- PART IV CONCLUDING THOUGHTS: CHARTING A SUSTAINABLE PATH FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
- Notes
- Index
Introduction to Part I
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Figures
- About the Editors
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Foreword
- Introduction: Charting a Sustainable Path for the Twenty-First Century Pharmaceutical Industry
- PART I PROFITS, PATIENTS' RIGHTS, AND SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS: THE ETHICS OF CLINICAL RESEARCH CONDUCTED IN PRIVATE ENTERPRISES
- Introduction to Part I
- 1 Drug Research: Between Ethical Demands and Economic Constraints
- 2 Emerging International Norms for Clinical Testing: Good Clinical Trial Practice
- 3 The Regulatory and Ethical Challenges of Pediatric Research
- 4 Including Children in Research: Participation or Exploitation?
- 5 Racial and Ethnic Inclusiveness in Clinical Trials
- 6 The Rights of Patients to Participate in Clinical Research
- 7 How Should Government Regulate Stem-Cell Research? Views from a Scientist-Legislator
- PART II MARKETING AND THE EFFICIENT UTILIZATION OF HEALTHCARE RESOURCES: ETHICAL AND PUBLIC POLICY CHALLENGES
- PART III PATENTS, PRICING, AND EQUAL ACCESS
- PART IV CONCLUDING THOUGHTS: CHARTING A SUSTAINABLE PATH FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
- Notes
- Index
Summary
INTRODUCTION
Pharmaceutical research is a complex social enterprise. It involves persons, commerce, and the advancement of medical knowledge, and it raises a broad array of ethical, scientific, and public policy issues. The chapters in this section analyze and suggest reforms in a number of these areas, including (1) the conflicts that arise between the profit maximization objectives of pharmaceutical companies and the ethical requirements of scientific research and medicine, particularly in regard to safety concerns and the diseases that are targeted; (2) the ethical safeguards for conducting research involving human subjects, particularly vulnerable subjects such as children and citizens of third world countries; (3) the patient's right to be included in drug trials that offer hope for terminal medical conditions, as well as the public health implications of including minority populations in drug trials; and (4) the scientific and ethical issues underlying stem cell research.
MEDICINE, SCIENCE, AND PROFIT MAXIMIZATION: AN UNEASY MIX
The dictates of medical and scientific ethics are sometimes at odds in clinical research, as for example in the administration of placebos to patients in control groups. Such conflicts arise because physicians are trained to cure and treat patients by administering therapeutic remedies, whereas scientists seek to establish facts and advance knowledge. For the most part, however, the advancement of knowledge and the betterment of patients ultimately are complementary goals.
It is the interjection of profit motivation into drug research that creates the greatest ethical challenges.
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- Ethics and the Pharmaceutical Industry , pp. 9 - 20Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005
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