Bioethics Journals Ignore the Developing World
In a short correspondence piece in this week's New England Journal of Medicine, Borry, Schtsman and Dirickx analyzed the country of residence of first authors in articles published in nine bioethics journals (AJOB was not included) between 1990 and 2003. The results?A total of 4029 research articles were retrieved from the nine journals under study (Table 1). Investigators from high-income economies contributed to 3873 of the publications (96.1 percent), and those from developing economies contributed to 156 (3.9 percent).[thanks Al Yarinsky (AMC)]In addition, the findings suggest that there has been no significant upward trend in the number of publications from developing countries.
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Bioethics is chiefly the domain of the developed world. As someone who was born in a developing country and grew up in the United States, I do think its interesting that people here get their shorts in a knot when the rest of the world is struggling just to stay alive. Next time you get agitated about some issue or other, just thank God that you live in good old U.S.A.
Maybe the developing world is just too busy trying to find its next meal, some clean water, and a way to prevent their continued exploitation by the "developed" world.
- by Atticus Finch on Aug 28, 2005 at 2:15 AM | link
Maybe the issue is a real one, when biomedical research is increasingly taking place in the developing world, but the ethics concerning that research is almost entirely coming from the developed countries. The idea that developing countries have no place, time or resources to think about this, and that it is fine that developing nations should do this for them, smacks of a colonalism. The idea too that everyone is living hand to mouth in these countries is an insulting generalization. Some of the most vibrant and politically astute bioethics discourse comes out of developing countries, like India and Brazil, if only people would bother to listen.
- by Sam I am on Aug 28, 2005 at 8:10 AM | link
I did not say that bioethics has no place in developing countries. Nor did I suggest that they had neither the time nor the resources. I was merely suggesting that there are more basic human survival issues facing these countries.
I would think that a developing countries would have vastly different views than those being bandied about in the west. They undoubtedly have brilliant scholars, but the fact that they are from places that the West has marginalized keeps them from gaining a wider hearing.
Your last point is one I whole heartedly agree with: that if we only took time to listen, we could possibly benefit from the "developing" world's scholars. But, please tell me, when has the West EVER done that?
We will steadily march down the road to all white-meat chicken, perfect children, and no diseases. Right?
- by Atticus Finch on Aug 28, 2005 at 4:06 PM | link