Medicine and ethics: the human at the center

Ethics has always played an important role in treatment and, more generally, in medicine. However, scientific developments and the recent pandemic have given the discussion a new dimension, turning it into a global problem and, if possible, even more urgent. We talked about it with Marco Annoni, researcher, author and popularizer, currently researcher in bioethics at the National Research Council (CNR), and responsible for the ethical supervision of the Veronesi Foundation, during a new appointment of “20 minutes from the future” .

The legacy of Covid on the ethical front. “There are many lessons we can draw from the current crisis. – Marco Annoni told us – What we bioethics experts have noticed, very interesting and little addressed, is that if before some aspects were the prerogative of very few experts, today they have become global problems and have entered a completely new dimension. An example, at the center of reflection in recent months, is that of the priority in the allocation of limited health resources. We have seen it with respirators in the most acute emergency phase, but we also see it with vaccines or other types of therapies. The question is: according to what criteria should we allocate health resources in case of scarcity? The current situation has widened this question to a global context, addressing it to everyone and raising a great deal of reflection and making the implementation of ethical guidelines urgent.

The rest of this entry is in italian.