A Draft Model Aggregated Code of Ethics for Bioethicists1

Abstract

Bioethicists function in an environment in which their peers—healthcare executives, lawyers, nurses, physicians—assert the integrity of their fields through codes of professional ethics. Is it time for bioethics to assert its integrity by developing a code of ethics? Answering in the affirmative, this paper lays out a case by reviewing the historical nature and function of professional codes of ethics. Arguing that professional codes are aggregative enterprises growing in response to a field's historical experiences, it asserts that bioethics now needs to assert its integrity and independence and has already developed a body of formal statements that could be aggregated to create a comprehensive code of ethics for bioethics. A Draft Model Aggregated Code of Ethics for Bioethicists is offered in the hope that analysis and criticism of this draft code will promote further discussion of the nature and content of a code of ethics for bioethicists. 1. This paper was originally presented at Union College on April 9, 2005 at the Ethics of Bioethics Spring Meeting of the American Society of Bioethics and Humanities, co-sponsored by the Albany Medical College and Graduate College of Union University Centers for Bioethics, and held in Albany and Schenectady, New York, April 7–9, 2005. A fuller version of the history examined in this article will be found in two forthcoming papers by the author, “A History of Codes of Ethics for bioethicists,” and “Codifying the Ethics of Bioethics.”