Toward an African-American perspective on bioethics.

Abstract

Over the last twenty years, the field of bioethics has assumed major importance, as advances in medical technology and rising costs of health care have forced society to come to terms with difficult ethical choices surrounding life and death, allocation of resources, and doctor/patient relationships. Today, one finds university departments and academic programs, hospital ethics committees, bioethics think tanks, and Presidential task forces devoted to medical ethics policy and decision-making. Furthermore, numerous conferences, journals, and books disseminate information and knowledge generated by the new profession. However, the mainstream literature emerging from this influential new field rarely includes discussions of race, class and gender…