[Chapter 4. Risks and benefits of medical nanotechnologies: a balancing to be Reconsidered].

Nanomedicine opens new diagnostic and therapeutic perspectives. So far, even if few health nanoproducts are on the market, more than a hundred are in clinical trials, mainly in oncology. In fact, the uncertainty that characterizes the knowledge of risks related to nanoparticles, such as the difficulty of adapting evaluation methodologies to the singularity of each of them, in turn, affects the establishment of the benefit-risk balance, prior to any marketing.

[Robotics and medical technology: which liability?].

Nowadays, medical robots become more and more important to better provide care, to remote patients and help to perform surgery. Legal et ethical issues relating to health care robots are not new, but are more complicated, in particular about the assignation of liabilitiy. This article will give an overview of some of the legal issues relating the use of robotics in health care and medical and surgical procedures: first in relation to the safety of these specific devices, and then in relation to the threats to privacy and individual liberties.

Legal aspects of the risks raised by nanotechnologies in the field of medicine.

The major breakthroughs achieved in nanotechnologies open new avenues in the field of healthcare--aid to diagnosis, upgrading medical treatment efficacy, development of regenerative medicine--but they are also associated with risks, hence the increasing need of legislation. So far very little research work has been conducted on this technology whose applications are still limited and whose potential hazards are not yet clearly apprehended. The more and more frequent uses of nanoparticles in medical imaging and in current research projects dealing with tissue engineering or RFID raises the following question: is the current legislative framework relevant in light of the specificities of nano-objects? The challenge is twofold: the legal approach must encompass the nanometric element itself as a "legal object" but it must include the use of nanotechnologies and their final aims.