The current status and challenges of bioethics education in undergraduate medical education in Karachi, Pakistan.

Background: The importance of including bioethics in the medical curricula has been recognized globally. Certain countries including Pakistan continue to lag behind although some developments have occurred recently.

Objectives: The research aimed to provide a snapshot of bioethics education in undergraduate medical colleges in Karachi, Pakistan.

COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among health service providers: A single centre experience from Karachi, Pakistan.

Objective: To assess the views of health service providers towards coronavirus disease 2019 vaccination with Cansino, Sinovac and Sinopharm vaccines.

Methods: The analytical cross-sectional study was conducted at the Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation, Karachi, in May and June 2021, and comprised doctors, nurses, technical staff, and medical social officers. Data was collected using a questionnaire, in Urdu and English languages, assessing determinants of hesitancy.

The meaninglessness of doing bioethics: Reality check from a conflict zone.

Running bioethics workshops one after the other can become a mundane affair, primarily because of the similarity of their content and discourse. However, conducting a workshop for participants from conflict zones such as Palestine provided an entirely new perspective for this author. While the bioethics discourse may translate into useful and actionable guidelines in the free world to help uphold human dignity, to those living in occupied territories and conflict zones, in the face of their lived lives, it appears little more than a self-serving academic exercise by "parachute bioethicists".

Biobanking in the subcontinent: exploring concerns.

Biobanking is an important tool for biomedical research. However, it raises a variety of ethical issues, which are compounded in the developing world. This paper is based on data from three sources on the ethical issues associated with biobanking, including a mixed method pilot study conducted with students in Karachi, Pakistan, a workshop in Karachi, and another workshop held in Bengaluru, India.

A degree in bioethics: an "introspective" analysis from Pakistan.

The success of degree-level bioethics programmes, a recent development across the world, is generally evaluated on the basis of their quantifiable impact; for instance, the number of publications graduates produce. The author conducted a study of Pakistani graduates who had pursued a higher qualification in bioethics, and on the basis of the respondents' written and verbal narratives, this paper presents an analysis of their perceptions of the internal impact of bioethics degree programmes. Using these narratives, the paper also analyses the reactions of their colleagues to their new qualification.

Ethical review in Pakistan: the credibility gap.

The concept of mandatory ethical review of research involving human participants is gradually taking root in Pakistani institutions. Based on the opinions of Institutional Review Board (IRB) members from institutions across the country, the process faces several challenges which threaten its integrity. The lack of registration or accreditation for IRBs has resulted in a wide variation in the calibre and working of such Boards.

To donate a kidney: public perspectives from Pakistan.

Despite the majority opinion of Muslim jurists that organ donation is permitted in Sharia, surveys indicate continuing resistance by lay Muslims, especially to donating organs following death. Pakistan, a country with 165 million Muslims, currently reliant on live donors, is considering steps to establish deceased donor programs which will require public acceptance and support. This article analyzes the results of in-depth interviews with 105 members of the public focusing on opinions and knowledge about juristic rulings regarding kidney donations, donor-family dynamics in deceased donation decisions, and attitudes towards buying kidneys.

Plagiarism and the medical fraternity: a study of knowledge and attitudes.

Objective: To assess knowledge and perceptions of plagiarism in medical students and faculty of private and public medical colleges in Karachi.

Methods: A questionnaire based study was conducted on groups of 4th year medical students and medical faculty members. Group A consisted of medical students while group B comprised faculty members.

Conflict of interest issues in informed consent for research on human subjects: a South Asian perspective.

Health research for progress in the control and conquest of disease afflicting man is unquestionable. Concerns arise when motives other than the advancement of scientific knowledge and benefit for individuals and society are the driving force behind clinical trials. These conflicts of interests become even more pronounced when dealing with populations rendered vulnerable by virtue of poverty and ignorance.