The Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) has published a new ‘Code of Conduct for data-driven health and care technology’ which cites ethical principles set out in our 2015 ‘Biodata’ report, ‘The collection, linking and use of data in biomedical research and health care: ethical issues’. An announcement on the DHSC website states ‘The code […]

Today, the Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Bill moves to the report stage in the House of Lords, taking us a step closer to a change in the law to introduce an opt-out system of consent for organ donation in England. The Nuffield Council on Bioethics strongly supports organ donation where it is in line with […]

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) now considers non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) to be within its regulatory remit and has begun inspecting private clinics that offer NIPT. This was prompted by a recommendation made in the Nuffield Council on Bioethics’ 2017 report on the ethics of NIPT. Private clinics have been offering NIPT to pregnant women […]

We welcome the findings and conclusions of the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee’s report Impact of social media and screen-use on young people’s health, particularly that social media companies must be subject to a formal legal duty of care to their users and that they must be willing to share data on the […]

The Nuffield Council on Bioethics has been invited to pitch an inquiry on commercial genomics to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee on 29 January. We submitted a response to the Committee’s ‘My Science’ inquiry, which invited suggestions from the public for possible future inquiries. The Committee received a total of 86 responses […]

The Council has begun a new in-depth inquiry on the ethical issues raised by the use of genome editing techniques in farmed animals. This is the third inquiry of our genome editing programme, which began in 2016 with genome editing: an ethical review, and was followed by genome editing and human reproduction, published in July […]

Former Chair of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, Jonathan Montgomery, has been awarded a knighthood in the New Years Honours for Services to Bioethics and Healthcare Law.

The Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP) has announced that ads will no longer be able to depict harmful gender stereotypes. The new rule in the Advertising Codes states: [Advertisements] must not include gender stereotypes that are likely to cause harm, or serious or widespread offence. This will apply to broadcast and non-broadcast media from 14 […]

The Nuffield Council on Bioethics is looking to recruit a number of new Council members to be part of the deliberative body that drives the intellectual function of the organisation. The main responsibilities of the role are to consider questions on strategic direction and topic identification, scrutinise and ensure the quality of reports and other […]