LETTER
Further Ethics Resources
Kaspar A. Zurcher
1 April 1995 | Volume 122 Issue 7 | Page 557
TO THE EDITOR:
In their recent annotated bibliography, Dunn and colleagues [1] failed to address one important ethical relationship among physician, patient, and society: the environmental issue. This issue is of increasing significance for several aspects of the medical profession, including 1) the obligation to reinforce arguments for an ecologically oriented policy in the interest of our patients and their health [for example, air pollution]; 2) pressure against environmental contamination by the medical industry or by medical treatment [for example, prohibition of inhalation devices containing halogenated hydrocarbon propellents that destroy the stratospheric ozone layer]; and 3) attention to our personal behavior in medical practice (for example, regulation of room temperature and restricted use of mercury-derived disinfectants).
The responsibility to future generations should be an additional motivation for physicians to be concerned for our biosphere and to consider the many aspects of an endangered world, including pollution of air, water, and food; population growth; loss of biodiversity; climatic change; and various types of natural or artificial radiation.
1. Dunn PM, Gallagher TH, Hodges MO, Prendergast TJ, Rubenfeld GD, Tolle SW, et al. Medical ethics: an annotated bibliography. Ann Intern Med. 1994; 121:627-32.
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