Proportionality and evidence-based pandemic management

Financial incentives for participants in health research: when are they ethical?

A matter of priority: equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines

"Going first: the ethics of vaccine self-experimentation in coronavirus times" 

On June 30, 2022, the Forum for Global Health Ethics and the Swiss Medical Weekly organised the webinar "Proportionality and Evidence-Based Policymaking in Public Health: The Case of COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates".

You can watch clips from the webinar here.

Our speakers presented their views on COVID-19 vaccine mandates, discussed the issues of proportionality and evidence-based policymaking, and answered questions from the audience.

Speakers

• Natasha Anwar (Aga Khan University Hospital, Pakistan) 
• Julian März (University of Zurich, Switzerland) 
• Fruzsina Molnár-Gábor (Heidelberg University, Germany)
• Ross Upshur (University of Toronto, Canada)

Hosts

• Nikola Biller-Andorno, Director of the Institute of Biomedical Ethics and History of Medicine, University of Zurich
• Tania Manríquez Roa, Coordinator of the Forum for Global Health Ethics, University of Zurich
   

On April 13, 2022, the Forum for Global Health Ethics, the Swiss Medical Weekly, The Global Health Network (University of Oxford) and LactaHub, jointly organised the webinar “Offering Financial Incentives to Participants in Health and Breastfeeding Research”.

Offering financial incentives is a common practice in health research to recruit participants, retain them, and promote health-related behaviours. Nevertheless, the use of these incentives remains controversial in some cases. This webinar provided a platform to discuss this topic.

Watch the webinar here
 

In March 2021, the Forum for Global Health Ethics, the Swiss Medical Weekly, and The Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences-Argentina, jointly organised the online Forum on Equitable Access to Covid-19 Vaccines. In this event, experts Arthur Caplan, Heidi Larson, Florencia Luna, Keymanthri Moodley, Rino Rappuoli and Jan Helge Solbakk, presented their positions on equitable access, engaged in a discussion and answered questions from the audience.

Watch short videos with each presentation and the discussion here.
Read a summary of the main issues discussed in the event here (PDF, 832 KB).
 

In December 2020, the Forum for Global Health Ethics and the Swiss Medical Weekly organised the online Forum on Ethics and Self-Experimentation in Times of Covid-19. Our guests were Preston Estep, Rebecca Dresser, Peter Kleist and Samia Hurst-Majno.

Watch the Forum on Ethics and Self-Experimentation in Times of Covid-19 here.

The Forum for Global Health Ethics is a community of practitioners, researchers, students and policy-makers who collaborate and discuss cases in the field of global health that pose ethical challenges. The Forum is hosted and coordinated by the Institute of Biomedical Ethics and History of Medicine (IBME) at the University of Zurich. This initiative is aligned with the WHO’s efforts to find collaborative solutions to global health challenges, and responds to its call for solidarity and international cooperation.

The spread of infectious diseases, the allocation of limited healthcare resources, human exposure to contamination, universal health coverage, access to vaccines and medicines, the implementation of new technologies in healthcare, and public trust in medicine, are classic examples of global health topics. Global health focuses on healthcare issues that transcend national borders and on global determinants of health.

Our aim is to exchange ideas and share knowledge among the global health ethics community. Specifically, we:

• Gather and examine cases that are ethically challenging in global health
• Enable a space for case-centred reflections and discussions
• Provide insights from ethicists 
• Facilitate networking among the global health ethics community
• Share knowledge on global health ethics

We collect real-world cases involving ethical challenges in any global health topic. The cases are gathered in thematic discussion rooms where discussants reflect on the cases and share their views. One ethicist participates in each discussion room, providing expert knowledge on the matter and exploring guidance for action.

Healthcare practitioners, researchers, students and policy-makers with an interest in the fields of global health and ethics. We welcome participants from all backgrounds, disciplines and regions of the world.