Health and well-being
What ethical norms should guide medical practices, health priorities, emerging health technologies, and research in the life sciences?
The promotion of health and well-being, both physical and mental, raises ethical challenges in a wide variety of contexts. For instance, the use of mental health labels for school pupils, the treatment of animals in medicine testing, and the imposition of lockdowns during a pandemic all involve policies that require a careful analysis of moral costs and benefits. Researchers within this theme work across the fields of bioethics, from medical ethics and public health to animal ethics and the responsible conduct of research.
Theme coordinator: Lucie White.
Some key publications within this theme
Below is a list of some key publications by our researchers within this theme. Full publication lists can be found through individual researchers' staff pages.
Work with external organisations within this theme
Our researchers work in advisory roles for a number of external organisations, such as the National Health Care Institute (each researcher's personal staff page lists any external advisory roles). In addition, we regularly work with external organisations, for whom we develop training sessions, ethical advisory reports and the like. We are currently working together with the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) to set up an 'ethics hub' to support ethical deliberation on their varied research themes.
Societal engagement within this theme
We regularly take part in activities aimed at a broader audience, such as podcasts, op-eds or talks at festivals such as Brainwash and Betweter. We host a regular Philosophy Café (usually in Dutch). Each year, together with Studium Generale, we organise the Utrecht Day of Philosophy.