In episode 15, our host, Associate Professor Nigel Crawford, speaks to Professor Lynn Gillam. Lynn is a clinical ethicist who trained in philosophy and bioethics. She is a Professor in the Centre for Health Equity, in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health at the University of Melbourne; and the Academic Director of The Children’s Bioethics Centre at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. The Children’s Bioethics Centre provides support including ethical decision making for clinicians in relation to patient care issues. Nigel and Lynn will discuss some of the ethical issues raised in the setting of SARS-CoV-2 vaccines, utilising a framework of points raised by Dr John Lantos from the Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, USA, at the recent Bioethics E-Conference hosted by The Children’s Bioethics Centre:

•The importance of realising that not doing something or not conducting research is a decision in itself
•The notion of “too fast can’t be safe” – some steps need to take the time they have always taken, some things can be done more quickly, recognising that if you do nothing, you are allowing harm to happen
•The role of ethical boards and the way vaccines are developed, i.e. the use of younger, healthier participants in research, not the individuals who are getting the worst disease
•The involvement of children and elderly people in clinical trials and the key differences in the ethical considerations of this
•Global equity of access to SARS-CoV-2 vaccines when they become available, who gets them first and how should these decisions be made?
•The role of Citizens’ Juries in deciding who has priority of access to vaccines in a pandemic situation
•Mandatory vaccination
•The use of foetal embryonic cell lines in vaccine development

Links:

Australian Financial Review: Vaccine confronts humanity with next moral test
https://www.afr.com/policy/health-and-education/vaccine-confronts-humanity-with-next-moral-test-20200803-p55i66

MVEC: Foetal embryonic cells utilised in vaccine development platforms
https://mvec.mcri.edu.au/immunisation-references/foetal-embryonic-cells-utilised-in-vaccine-development-platforms/

University of Melbourne: Gaining clarity on the ethical issues of a possible COVID-19 vaccine
https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/gaining-clarity-on-the-ethical-issues-of-a-possible-covid-19-vaccine

BMC Public Health: Including the public in pandemic planning: a deliberative approach
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1471-2458-10-501

Social Science and Medicine: The use of citizens’ juries in health policy decision making: a systematic review
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027795361400166X#bbib7

RCH Grand Rounds: Let no pandemic go to waste – how the COVID crisis could lead to better health care delivery
https://blogs.rch.org.au/grandrounds/2020/09/02/let-no-pandemic-go-to-waste-how-the-covid-crisis-could-lead-to-better-health-care-delivery/