BIOETHICAL TOOLKIT

1. Define the following

Ethics:

Bioethics:

2. How can you identify ethical issues?

3. What are some examples of bioethical issues?

4. List the steps involved in the analysis of ethical issues.

5. Name and describe the 3 approaches to bioethics.

Bioethics Hat Description

approach

6. Test yourself - match each of the following approaches to bioethical concepts with their focus.
 Approach Answer Focus

a. Virtue-based Ethical rules and duties that must be followed,

regardless of consequences

b. Consequence-based The end outcomes and possible consequences

c. Duty-based The morals or virtues of an individual

7. Example of a bioethical issue - “mandatory vaccination against COVID-19 for healthcare

workers”. Use the different approaches to analyse this issue.

Consequences - based approach:

Mandatory Covid-19 vaccination

for health workers

Duty/rule- based approach: Virtues - based approach:

8. When analysing bioethical issues, we need to apply one or more ethical approaches (hats)
and consider one or more concepts (glasses) to evaluate what an ethical approach or
solution would be. Name and describe each of the ethical concepts.

Ethical Glasses Description

concept

9. When exploring a bioethical issue in your chosen research question, it will be important that
you also consider different factors that influence this issue. These fall into four main
categories: social, economic, legal and political. Define each of the following factors:
i. Social factors:

ii. Economic factors:

iii. Legal factors:

iv. Political factors:

10. Reproductive technologies such as IVF and prenatal-implantation genetic diagnosis often
involve many bioethical considerations that are influenced by the factors listed in Question
9. For each of these factors, highlight an example in relation to reproductive technologies.
 Factor Example

Social factor

Economic factor

Legal factor

Political factor