Bio-Medical Ethics
Bio-medical ethics are the moral principles that apply accepted values to the practice of clinical medicine. These ethical principles include respect for autonomy, justice, beneficence, and non-maleficence. The cases against Bill and Jane in this assignment already depict a breach in one of the moral principles; the respect for autonomy. Respect for autonomy is deeply rooted in social respect for individuals, which define the medical quality outcome. Such breaches always compromise the quality of medical outcomes as witnessed in the two cases. The two cases are similar in the sense that they are both resulting from deliberate actions. Jane knows she is pregnant, and still deliberately drinks a drug that exposes the unborn to the risks of disability. Similarly, Bill knows about his genetic defects but proceeds to impregnate someone we are not told was a wife or not.
Nevertheless, on a moral basis, the case against Jane lacks moral merit since it is a case resulting from a deliberate action, which perhaps was meant to eliminate the unborn. On the other hand, the case against Bill may be morally upheld because procreation is a matter of eternity, whether someone has genetic defects or not. The fact that Bill has a genetic defect does not automatically imply the child will also inherit the gene defects. This is because the crossing of the alleles may result in an offspring without the gene defect. Additionally, having abnormalities within the genes does not rule out procreation either. As opposed to the case against Jane, Bill’s case attracts moral support even from the theological perspective. It is with an uncertainty that Bill’s child will have gene defects. On the other hand, the drug that Jane drunk will expose her child to the risks of disability. Even though the chances of abnormality are equal in both cases, Jane stands a higher chance of delivering an abnormal baby compared to Bill.
For pregnant women, it is morally unaccepted, and unethical to consume drugs, which interferes with the normal development of the unborn. Therefore, the deliberate act by Jane to drink the medicine may be pegged to instances of attempted abortion or miscarriage. Whether she followed a clinician’s prescription or not, I would still assume the case is unethical due to the firm belief of attempted miscarriage. Women in such conditions are always under the care of the clinicians who recommend safe drugs both for the foetus, and the mother. An example is the use of the deworming drugs among pregnant women. Deworming drugs, which are too powerful are not recommended for pregnant women.
The two cases should be treated with the utmost legal distinction. First, the motives that drove Jane into consuming the drug are comparatively worse than Bill’s motives. Nobody would like to give birth to an abnormal child. Secondly, Bill might have wanted a baby having known that even himself, his genotypic composition may be wrong, but in terms of the phenotypes, he is surviving. On the contrary, Jane being a gravid lady, she must have undergone all the necessary dietary pieces of training or recommendations. The recommendations outline certain drugs, which a gravid lady must not use for the survival of the unborn. But what we see in her case was a deliberate action against the preservation of the life of the unborn. Such a voluntary action on the legal perspective is commensurate to a murder case. However, we see the child will be more likely to be born with a disability ruling out death, but the intentions of Jane were not as bad as Bill’s intentions; thus the two cases are treated differently legally.