Human Rights

Human rights law and discourse help to ensure respect for individual worth and the common good in the face of powerful biotechnologies. Claims to universal human rights depend, in part, on formal recognition of our common humanity. Many countries and international declarations use human rights as a broad framework for establishing policies regarding human biotechnologies. Examples include the Council of Europe's Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine and UNESCO's Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights, both of which reject biotechnology applications that would alter the genomes of future generations.

The NYPD's new DNA dragnet: The department is collecting and storing genetic information, with virtually no rules to curb their use

By Allison Lewis, Daily News | 02.08.2019

Aggregated News

If you think clandestine DNA dragnets and secret databases are things of science fiction, I have some upsetting news.

From the same law enforcement playbook that brought you stop-and-frisk comes the latest form of racial profiling and policing: the knock-and-spit....

Technologies

Book Review: "Personalised Medicine, Individual Choice and the Common Good"

By Gina Maranto, Guest Contributor | 02.06.2019

Biopolitical Times

In this new volume in the Cambridge Bioethics and Law series, editors Britta van Beers, a legal philosopher at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Sigrid Sterckx, founding member of Bioethics Institute Ghent, and Donna Dickenson, Emeritus Professor of Medical Ethics and Humanities at the University of London bring together a group of far-reaching essays on the much ballyhooed trend toward personalized medicine.

As defined by the editors, personalized medicine—also termed “precision” medicine—leverages current understanding of the genome...

Technologies