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PRINCIPLES REGARDING BIOETHICS

The American Medical Student Association:

1. In regard to the allocation of health resources:

a. ENCOURAGES efforts on the part of health care practitioners to identify the benefits that patients receive from various treatments, from new technologies and facilities, and to decide when costs are not justified by benefits;

b. SUPPORTS careful, reasoned and full public debate before decisions are made regarding the allocation of health care resources;

c. BELIEVES rationing must occur in a fair and equitable manner, regardless of a patient's ability to pay. Data obtained in outcomes research should be considered along with other factors in a national discourse regarding allocation of limited health-care resources. (1994)

2. In regard to organ transplantation:

a. SUPPORTS the notion that policies to insure an adequate supply of cadaver donor organs, including bone marrow, should be thoroughly investigated;

b. URGES that efforts be directed by the medical, governmental and lay communities toward development of procedures that will educate the public toward the need for donor supply and to initiate and facilitate means for allowing himself/herself or his/her loved ones to become organ donors;

c. URGES that acceptance of an organ, including bone marrow, for transplant from a live donor be based on the high motivation of the donor and the improved success of the recipient;

d. OPPOSES the morally reprehensible "free market" sale concept by unrelated donors whose primary incentive is economic. (1985)

e. URGES the continued research into artificial and/or animal transplant models for safe use in transplant candidates; (1997)

f. SUPPORTS the use of animal organs for transplants according to the medical and governmental guidelines until a suitable cadaver, living and/or artificial supply can be procured; (1997)

g. STRONGLY SUPPORTS the consideration for the welfare of the animals used for organ donation. (1997)

3. SUPPORTS the establishment of a standing hospital ethics committee authorized to recommend treatment or other procedural decisions during situations which are complicated by dilemmas of medical ethics. Such a committee would be available upon request by either the patient or the physician.

4. In regard to fetal tissue research and transplantation: (1990)

a. RECOGNIZES the therapeutic potential of fetal tissue transplantation for diseases such as Parkinson's and Type I Diabetes Mellitus; (1990)

b. BELIEVES that the use of fetal tissue in research is an acceptable public policy because it is intended to achieve significant medical goals; (1990)

c. BELIEVES that using fetal tissue for research purposes does not signify approval of or encourage abortion; (1990)

d. OPPOSES the transplantation of tissue from spontaneously aborted fetuses into human subjects because such tissue is associated with genetic abnormalities, infectious agents and other abnormalities; (1990)

e. OPPOSES abortion performed solely for the specific purpose of donating fetal tissue for research and transplantation; (1990)

f. OPPOSES the role of politics of abortion in influencing the course of research that is done by government scientists and funded with federal money; (1990)

g. URGES the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to lift the moratorium on federal funding of human fetal tissue transplantation research utilizing tissue from induced abortions; (1990)

h. URGES that the National Institutes of Health develop policies designed to insulate a woman's consent to abort from her consent to donate tissue; prevent monetary or other gains for the donation; require that procurement agencies not profit from such transactions; reaffirm that the primary concern in obtaining fetal tissue should continue to be the health of the pregnant women; and emphasize that the properties of fetal tissue, such as the optimum gestational age for use in research, should not be a factor in deciding the timing or the procedure of an abortion; (1990)

i. URGES that medical personnel who participate in an abortion should not receive any direct benefit from the subsequent use of fetal tissue from that abortion; (1990)

j. URGES that compliance with the above mentioned policies be required for receipt of federal funds. (1990)