The UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and Human Rights will hold its 6th international workshop to discuss the issues of Informed Consent and Clinical Research. Being part of the i-Consent consortium, a project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program,the ethical reflection of the workshop will focus on the multicultural and interdisciplinary dimension of ethical requirements of informed consent applied to translational/clinical research and vaccination.
International Experts on the field will discuss:
1. How much of the notion of informed consent is applied in different
cultural and religious traditions? And in which way?
2. Can or should we have different informed consent forms for
differently vulnerable populations?
3. Do all traditions agree with the general principles behind informed
consent (i.e. the prioritization of individual autonomy)? If not, what
alternative values/approach could support widespread
vaccination?
A debate to improve clarity and promote social inclusion
The UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and Human Rights, Rome, in collaboration with the Scalabrini international Migration Institute (SIMI) and other institutions, has organized a day dedicated to a debate on “Human Dignity and Human Rights of Refugees” within the project “Europe Citizens for Solidarity”- Eurosol, financed under the Europe For Citizens Programme of the European Commission, in Rome November 27. The public forum will be held at Aula Master dell’Università Europea di Roma e dell’Ateneo Pontificio Regina Apostolorum, Via degli Aldobrandeschi, 190 from 9:30 am to 6:00 pm.
The forum will be divided into three sessions; each session will discuss a subject linked to the refugees’ situation from a bioethical and human rights perspective. The first session will be dedicated to Refugees: Threat or Opportunity? Context, Causes and Perspectives. The Refugees’ Situation: The Voice of the Protagonists, with the intervention of Fr. Aldo Skoda, Director of SIMI, followed by Rights and Duties of the Refugee from a Bioethics Perspective, and concluding with Refugee’s Integration from an Intercultural and Religious Perspective.
The forum’s objective is to promote intercultural dialogue and to find creative solutions and proposals by sharing knowledge and competency. Experts, refugees, migrants, politicians interested in the current challenge will be the protagonists of this debate. Among the authorities present will be the UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and Human rights Director, Dr. Alberto Garcia, SIMI’s Director, Fr. Aldo Skoda, Giorgio de Acutis of the Italian Red Cross – Comitato Area Metropolitana di Roma Capitale (Area sociale), and Dr. Veronica Roldan expert in Sociology and Methodology of Social Research.
Moreover, international organization, such as Fundación Altius Francisco de Vitoria, Madrid, Spain Dirección General de Servicios Sociales de Integración Social, Madrid, Spain BIDA e V. Kultur und Bildung, Suhl, Germany Erevnitiko Idrima P.L. Nicosia, Cyprus, European Information Centre, Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria, Stowarzyszenie B-4, Rzeszòw, Poland, Viesoji istaiga Vilniaus Verslo Kolegija, Vilnius, Lithuania, Diagrama Foundation Psychosocial Intervention, Dunstable, United Kingdom will take part in the forum.
The UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and Human Rights presents a Public Forum Debate on “Human Dignity and Human Rights of Refugees” as part of the European Citizens for Solidarity (EUROSOL) project co-funded by the Europe for Citizens programme of the European Union. The Forum will be divided in three sessions with three themes related to refugee crisis from a bioethical and human rights perspective. Gathering experts, refugees, migrants, policymakers and other stakeholders from different backgrounds, the aim of the forum is to promote intercultural dialogue and find some creative solutions and proposals through information, knowledge and expertise sharing, discussions and cooperation in best solidary practices dealing with the current challenging crisis that refugees endure.
Social Responsibility and Health from Six Religious Perspectives
This is a report of a workshop of bioethics scholars from six different religions that took place in Mexico City in 2014. The topic for this encounter was to analyze Article 14 of the UNESCO Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights concerning “Social Responsibility and Health.” This was part of an ongoing project of interreligious dialogue of the project of Bioethics, Multiculturalism and Religion of the UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and Human Rights. Speakers were assigned to write main papers from the perspectives of Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism, along with responses, one within the same faith tradition and the other from a different one. Each of the contributors were asked to explore Art.14§1 and §2a of the Declaration, focusing on the issues of justice, access and social responsibility in healthcare, according to the different aforementioned religious perspectives. Furthermore, they were asked to delineate how religion has contributed in improving the health of the society.
Article 14 states:
The promotion of health and social development for their people is a central purpose of governments that all sectors of society share.
Taking into account that the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition, progress in science and technology should advance:
access to quality health care and essential medicines, especially for the health of women and children, because health is essential to life itself and must be considered to be a social and human good;
In this encounter, we saw how the principle of social responsibility is understood according to different religious traditions: Judaism conceives it as universal equality; Islam as duty to God; Christianity as neighborly love; Confucianism as duty towards the family; Hinduism as a right balance of different duties; and Buddhism as active compassion. The report will also cover the areas of convergence, differences and challenges faced by these religions and cultures. They regard the relationship between state and religion in an ever secularized world; the relationship between health and salvation; the question of egalitarian distribution; and the relation between responsibility and rights.
On Tuesday June 27th, the UNESCO Chair in Bioethics and Human Rights took part in the event host by Diagrama Foundation in Chatham, UK. As part of the eight partners of European Citizens for Solidarity (EUROSOL), co-funded by the Europe for Citizens programme of the European Union, Diagrama Foundation invited migrants, refugees, and experts in this sector to attend an interactive art workshop.
The session opened with the presentation of the Fundación Altius Francisco de Vitoria on the main aspects, aims and prospects of EUROSOL project by the European Director Clara Úbeda Saelices. The event moved on to Nathan Ward’s contribution, drew a metaphor between birds’ migration with human migration and stressed the natural process in both birds and human beings in moving around the world for survival. He also explained the main aspects of the UK history and law regarding migrants and remarked upon the controversial idea of welcoming in detention centres. He explained that detention centres for first facilities often remind prisons.
In the second part of the event, the representatives of the UNESCO Chair, Dr. Alberto Garcia, Ing. Kevin Ramirez, and Serena Montefusco had the chance to express their perspective with the guidance of the Sensitive Labyrinth Theatre, Germany. It was an introspective experience where participants, at first, had to express with gestures and words what is most related to the refugees and solidarity topics. Second, the workshop participants divided into two groups to let them express their points of view and the reasons why they were chosen to be there through a drawing or a composition with newspaper. It was challenging for the audience to go all the way back to their beginning of careers, experience, and their life to appreciate their presence at the workshop.
In the third and last session, the guest Shawn Owen, from Migrant Help UK, presented Migrant Help organization and what it has been doing in delivering advice and supporting vulnerable migrants in the UK for more than 50 years. His intervention gave audience the possibility to better understand the actual situation in UK regarding refugees, human rights, and human trafficking. Apart from collecting data on how many asylum seekers are in UK, the aims of Migrant Help organization are to provide education, health care, legal, and psychological support. Even though the number of abused and trafficked people is still shocking, thanks to this organization as well as Diagrama Foundation and many others, it is interesting to see how numbers are decreasing. However, Owen highlighted that we are not talking about numbers but people, entire families, women, men, minors, who face atrocities along the journey in order to have a better chance in life. Birds migration is part of birds’ survival just as migration has been part of humanity since time immemorial.
The event held in Chatham was not only an occasion for discussion, confrontation, and dialogue among the participants, but also an occasion for Chair Director Alberto Garcia, to present the “Code of Ethics” that was prepared for the consortium. The role of UNESCO Chair is essential to carry out the entire EUROSOL project and in preparation of a Public Forum on “Human Dignity and Human Rights of Refugees” on November 27th in Rome through an ethical perspective.
One of Chair’s chief areas of interest since its 2009 has been Bioethics, Multiculturalism and and Religion. The Chair is thus deeply concerned with promoting and protecting the common human rights of all issues. Migration is a complex phenomenon that affects individuals of all creeds and cultures. Thus, the Chair’s experience in fostering the art of convergence and cooperation in global ethics enables her to join diverse groups of individuals committed to creating more just and welcoming societies.
