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What Research Ethics Should Learn from Genomics and Society Research: Lessons from the ELSI Congress of 2011

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2021

Gail E. Henderson ,
Eric T. Juengst ,
Nancy M. P. King ,
Kristine Kuczynski  and
Marsha Michie
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Extract

In much the same way that genomic technologies are changing the complexion of biomedical research, the issues they generate are changing the agenda of IRBs and research ethics. Many of the biggest challenges facing traditional research ethics today — privacy and confidentiality of research subjects; ownership, control, and sharing of research data; return of results and incidental findings; the relevance of group interests and harms; the scope of informed consent; and the relative importance of the therapeutic misconception — have become important policy issues over the last 20 years because of the ways they have been magnified by genomic research efforts. Research that examines the ethical, legal, and social implications (ELSI) of human genomics research has become a burgeoning international field of scholarship over the last 20 years, thanks in part to its support first by the genome research funding bodies in the U.S. and then by national science agencies in other countries.

Type
Symposium
Information
Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics , Volume 40 , Issue 4 , Winter 2012 , pp. 1008 - 1024
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics 2012

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References

The “2011 ELSI Congress: Expanding the ELSI Universe” was held in Chapel Hill, NC, from April 12–14, hosted by the Center for Genomics and Society at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, an NHGRI-funded Center of Excellence in ELSI Research (P50 HG004488, Gail Henderson, PI). The Congress was funded by a supplement to this center grant. Other sponsors included the Carolina Center for Genome Sciences; the UNC School of Medicine, Department of Social Medicine; the UNC Center for Bioethics; the Wake Forest University Center for Bioethics, Health and Society; and the North Carolina Translational and Clinical Sciences Institute.Google Scholar
In the fall of 2003, the NHGRI in collaboration with U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) launched a new initiative to create interdisciplinary Centers of Excellence in ELSI Research (CEER). The CEERs are designed to bring investigators from multiple disciplines together to work in innovative ways to address important new, or particularly persistent, ethical, legal, and social issues related to advances in genetics and genomics. In addition, the centers will support the growth of the next generation of researchers on the ethical, legal and social implications of genomic research. Special efforts will be made to recruit potential researchers from under-represented groups. See <http://www.genome.gov/ELSI/#al-4> (last visited December 7, 2012).+(last+visited+December+7,+2012).>Google Scholar
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