An Ethical Breakdown, Research Paper Example

A New York Times editorial reports an ethical breakdown regarding a study on premature babies conducted by some universities in United States of America. Precise reports are that inspite of attempts to reform unethical research conduct in United States of America it was discovered that 23 Universities authorized studies, which did not meet describing accurately the benefits and of the project. The research project encompassed studies on extremely premature babies (Resnik, 2011).Consequently, federal authorities insisted that that University of Alabama at Birmingham, one of the leading institutions involved in the project as well as and Stanford, Duke and Yale along with about 20 other institutions immediately adopt measures that would limit such violation in the future ( Editorial Board, 2013).

Federal authorities contend that all research must comply with regulations regarding ethical conduct. Besides, approval must be obtained after they have satisfactorily complied with stated regulations. Some of these regulations require that investigatorsbe exposed to additional training in the ethical research conduct. This training is mandatory because they must be updated with adjustments in research ethics. Investigators are responsible for being available for these training sessions. The research investigated 1, 300 babies born between 24-27 weeks gestation (Editorial Board, 2013).

This could have happened deliberately since the Universities felt that perhaps they have immunity tom conduct research anyway they want. In my opinion it is merely disrespect form the law and parents of the babies who could not give any consent form themselves. Precisely, investigators representing university authorities should ask parents’ parents even prior to delivery. Parents who did not consent infant should have been excluded from the research. Consequently, when this information gets public credibility of these universities will be compromised (Skovdal & Abebe, 2012).

References

Editorial Board (April 15^th, 2013).An Ethical Breakdown.New York Times

Resnik, D. (2011).What is Ethics in Research & Why is it Important? National Institute of Development and Health Science.

Skovdal, M., & Abebe, T. (2012) Reflexivity and dialogue: Addressing methodological and socio-ethical dilemmas in research with HIV-affected children in East Africa.Ethics, Policy andEnvironment 15(1):77-96