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Database Research: Public and Private Interests

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 August 2011

Extract

It is often argued that a major tension in bioethics is between protecting the private interests of individuals on one hand and contributing to the common good on the other. In this article I ask how fitting this description is as regards the interest at stake in relation to the issue of consent to participation in population data collections. I raise some doubts about what I take to be two common positions regarding public and private interests in this context. The first is that restricted individual consent protects private interests at the cost of public interest.

Type
Special Section: From Informed Consent to No Consent?
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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