A Belmont Report for Animals?
by Drs. Hope Ferdowsian, L. Syd M Johnson, Jane Johnson, Andrew Fenton, Adam Shriver, and John Gluck
Responding to historical abuses in human research, The Belmont Report published key ethical principles to which human research should adhere: respect for autonomy, obligations to beneficence (doing good) and justice, and special protections for vulnerable individuals and populations.
Yet nonhuman animals don’t receive similar protections.
In this article published in Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics, Dr. Hope Ferdowsian and her colleagues suggests a way to continue to improve medical research ethics through a Belmont Report for Animals.