Curious Bioethics: June 19-June 25, 2023
Dobbs anniversary, Trans care, Billionaires v. Refugee coverage
In today’s curated collection, you’ll find:
Bioethics in the News: Dobbs’ 1st anniversary; Privacy records for Transgender patients in Tennessee given to AG; federal judges overturn anti-trans laws in three states
Recommended Reading: Two Episodes at Sea, Dollars for Life
Educational Opportunities: abortion data and the future of abortion activism, Ethics and AI conversation
Hey there, Curious Human!
Happy Sunday! For those of you out and about today for Pride and Abortion advocacy, stay safe out there.
Bioethics in the News
Dobbs’ One-Year Anniversary
“If 50 years ago the field of OB-GYN had not been so skittish about abortion and this care had been firmly entrenched in medical institutions, it is quite possible that abortion would have come to be understood — by the medical profession and the general public — primarily as health care and not as the most divisive issue in American politics.”
~Carole Joffe in STAT News
On the anniversary of losing a federal right to abortion, there is a lot of bad stuff to reflect on. Once turned over to states, Americans’ access to abortion quickly devolved into chaos and is compounding maternal morbidity and mortality. Carole Joffe, an Ob/Gyn at UCSF, writes poignantly that OB-GYNs missed a critical opportunity to solidify abortion as health care after Roe.
Jessica Valenti at
is a critical abortion resource. In her post below, she outlines the biggest stories of the last year related to the loss of abortion access for millions of Americans. For a great interview with Jessica, check out Boom! Lawyered.
Vanderbilt turns over transgender patient records to state in attorney general probe
Vanderbilt University Medical Center has turned over transgender patient medical records to the Tennessee Attorney General's office, which confirmed Tuesday it is conducting an investigation into potential medical billing fraud… "billing for transgender care services provided to individuals enrolled in State-sponsored insurance plans." The state requested medical records from Jan. 1, 2018 to the present.
The state claims the probe is solely related to potential billing fraud and not transgender care. In the current political climate, Tennessee patients are scared their records will be used inappropriately by the government to deny critical healthcare needs and further harass and marginalize them.
While we’re talking about trans issues in Tennessee:
On Friday, June 23, the state also dismissed a request to overturn a 1977 law so that transgender patients to change the sex on their birth certificates. (On the same day, Kansas’ AG moved to ban changing sex on birth certificates)
The U.S. Department of Justice complaint against Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors is ongoing.
Tennessee’s drag ban was found to be unconstitutional.
This week, Federal Judges Struck Down Anti-Transgender Laws in Three States
“Gender identity is real. The record makes this clear.”
~Judge Hinkle re: Florida Medicaid case
Indiana’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors will not take effect on July 1, thanks to a preliminary injunction. The ban on gender-affirming surgeries will remain in effect. Indiana doctors will be allowed to communicate with out-of-state doctors about gender-affirming care for their minor patients.
Judge James M. Moody Jr. wrote in an 80-page ruling that Arkansas’ 2021 “Save Adolescents from Experimentation Act” violated the US Constitution and that state officials cannot enforce the law.
U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle overturned Florida’s ban on Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming care.
Recommended Reading
Two episodes at sea
The submersible Titan and hundreds of refugees drowned in the Mediterranean
“One hundred eleven years [after Titanic], class divisions have reached an even higher and more malignant stage. It has now become a tale, in fact, of two distinct vessels: the Titan, on the one hand, and the fishing boat that sank on June 13 in the Mediterranean, killing hundreds of desperate refugees, on the other.”
~David Walsh
The non-stop media coverage of the lost Titan vessel and its five wealthy passengers lies in stark contrast to the hundreds of refugees from Pakistan, Egypt, Syria, Afghanistan, and Palestine, who died mostly nameless, unidentified, and uncelebrated.
In “Two Episodes at Sea,” David Walsh captures the classism, risk-taking, and drama of the latest sea-based disasters and contextualizes them with the Titanic’s fated history.
Of note, David Walsh wrote this perspective while attempts at rescuing the Titan were still underway. Since then, the occupants were declared dead citing a catastrophic implosion of the craft.
Dollars for Life
The Anti-Abortion Movement and the Fall of the Republican Establishment
Mary Ziegler’s book Dollars for Life connects the dots from conservative political activism to control the Supreme Court, Citizens United impact on campaign finance, and abortion.
Professor Zeigler has written numerous other books on abortion law - all of which are worth your time if you like to nerd out on legal bioethics issues as I do.
Educational Opportunities
No registration, just go straight to YouTube for on-demand bioethics education.
Abortion policies in the United States since Roe v. Wade was overturned
Post Roe
Legal Challenges, Political Strategies, Activism for Justice
Bloomberg Roundtable on Ethics in AI
Dr. Alex Hanna, Director of Research, Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR), Navrina Singh, Founder & CEO, Credo AI and Meredith Whittaker, President, Signal Foundation discuss the ethics of AI with Bloomberg’s Sarah Frier at the Bloomberg Technology Summit.
That’s it!
As always, thanks for being curious!
Hit reply and let me know what ethics issues you are most curious about this week—I’d love to hear from you!
See you next week!
Be Well & Be Curious,
Alyssa