The Growth of Dual-Use Bioethics

1. The Growth of Dual-Use Bioethics Lecture No.13

2. 1. Outline Dual-use as an ethical issue Slides 2 – 3 Duties associated with dual-use science Slides 4 – 9 Tensions in benefit and risk analysis Slides 10 – 12 Precautionary principle Slides 13 – 16 Statement on Scientific Publication and Security Slides 17 - 18 Decision making for dual-use dilemmas Slides 19 - 20

3. 2. Dual-use as an ethical issue (i) The dual-use dilemma arises in the context of research in the biological and other sciences as a consequence of the fact that one and the same piece of scientific research sometimes has the potential to be used for harm as well as for good.

4. 3. Dual-use as an ethical issue (ii) Dual-use raises the ethical question: should we hold an agent morally responsible for the consequences of an action when those consequences were not intended and were, in some cases, beyond the agent’s control? It asks whether a person is morally bound to take pre-emptive precautions to avoid unwanted future outcomes.

5. 4. Duties associated with dual-use science (i) One influential definition of the bioethical principle of non-maleficence (the obligation to do no harm) states that not to do harm covers not only intentional actions but also imposing risks of harm. Individuals can therefore harm or place another person at risk without harmful intent – and crucially, be morally responsible for doing so.

6. 5. Duties associated with dual-use science (ii) Five criteria for the obligation to prevent harm. Researchers should strive to prevent harm that is: - Within their professional responsibility - with their professional capacity and ability - Reasonably foreseeable risk - Proportionally greater than the benefits - Not more easily achieved by other means.

7. 6. Duties associated with dual-use science (iii) The authors propose the following ethical obligations to: - Prevent bioterrorism - Engage in response activities to bioterror attacks - Consider the negative implications of their research - Not publish or share sensitive information - Oversee and limit access to dangerous material - Report activities of concern

8. 7. Duties associated with dual-use science (iv) The authors conclude that the: “more reasonable obligations are duties to consider potential negative implications of one's research, protect access to sensitive material, technology and knowledge, and report activities of concern. Responsibility, therefore, includes obligations concerned with preventing foreseeable and highly probable harm.”

9. 8. Duties associated with dual-use science (v) “The question here is not how far a scientist is responsible for the intended effects of his action, but how far he is responsible for the foreseen effects of his research, for their prevention and also for the effort to predict certain results.”

10. 9. Duties associated with dual-use science (vi) This author proposes a general duty to not contribute to dual-use that is malign and, as far as controllable, to help to prevent it. This leads to more specific duties which include: - Do not carry out a certain type of research - Systematically anticipate dual-use applications in order to warn of dangers generated by them - Inform public authorities about such dangers - Do not disseminate results publicly, but keep dangerous scientific knowledge secret

11. 10. Tensions in benefit and risk analysis (i) What is at stake are rights to academic freedom and scientific progress against the public’s right to not be put at risk by the very research which is meant to help them.

12. 11. Tensions in benefit and risk analysis (ii) Ethics requires us to recognise a balance of rights and responsibilities. Ethical analyses of dual-use research in the biological sciences would seek to quantify actual and potential benefits and risks, and actual and potential recipients/bearers of these benefits and risks.

13. 12. Tensions in benefit and risk analysis (iii) “A commonsense position is that trade-offs need to be made between rights to disseminate and scientific progress on the one hand, and security/public health needs on the other. On this view, we should sometimes be willing to make at least small sacrifices in the way of public health and/or security when this is necessary to achieve enormous benefits with regard to the progress of science; and we should sometimes be willing to make at least very small sacrifices with regard to the progress of science when this is necessary to achieve enormous benefits regarding public health and/or security.”

14. 13. Precautionary Principle (i) The Precautionary Principle (PP) constitutes a principle for decision-making that applies to cases where serious adverse effects can occur with an unknown probability. A fundamental message of the PP is that 'on some occasions, measures against a possible hazard should be taken even if the available evidence does not suffice to treat the existence of that hazard as a scientific fact'.

15. 14. Precautionary Principle (ii) The precautionary principle is implied in many Biosecurity Codes of Conduct. For example, “All persons and institutions engaged in any aspect of the life sciences must . . . seek to restrict dissemination of dual-use information and knowledge to those who need to know in cases where there are reasonable grounds to believe that the information or knowledge could be readily misused through bioterrorism or biowarfare.”

16. 15. Precautionary Principle (iii) There are four main conceptual dimensions, which commonly occur in different versions of the precautionary principle : threat, uncertainty, prescription and action. So that: “if there is (1) a threat, which is (2) uncertain, then some kind of (3) action is (4) mandatory”.

17. 16. Precautionary Principle (iv) The authors propose a precautionary principle for dual-use: “When and where serious and credible concern exists that legitimately intended biological material, technology or knowledge in the life sciences pose threats of harm to human health and security, the scientific community is obliged to develop, implement and adhere to precautious measures to meet the concern.”

18. 17. Statement on Scientific Publication and Security (i) “We recognize that on occasion an editor may conclude that the potential harm of publication outweighs the potential societal benefits. Under such circumstances, the paper should be modified or not be published. Journals and scientific societies can play an important role in encouraging investigators to communicate results of research in ways that maximize public benefits and minimize risks of misuse.”

19. 18. Statement on Scientific Publication and Security (ii) “The Statement claims that editors may sometimes make censorship decisions, but it gives no reasons for thinking that editors, or the scientific community in general, for that matter, are especially qualified to judge security risks. An important question thus concerns the extent to which the government, bioethicists and/or the security community should be involved in scientific censorship.”

20. 19. Decision making for dual-use dilemmas (i) - Complete autonomy of individual scientist - Institutional control - Mix of institutional and governmental control - An independent authority - Full governmental control

21. 20. Decision making for dual-use dilemmas (ii) Most bioethicists believe that only a mixed authority which is constituted by the scientific community together with government bodies can address the dual-use dilemma. Determining who is responsible in a given case will be “context dependent”.

22. Sample Questions • Why is dual-use an ethical problem? 2. What are the ethical obligations that ethicists propose for scientists working in dual-use? Do you agree with them and why/why not? 3. What is the precautionary principle and what is its relevance to dual-use? 4. What are the options for ethical decision-making in the dual-use context and which options do you think are best?

23. References (Slide 2) Miller, M., and Selgelid, M. (2007) Ethical and Philosophical Consideration of the Dual-Use Dilemma in the Biological Sciences, Science and Engineering Ethics 13(4). 523-580. Available from http://www.springerlink.com/content/n514272v537582vv/ (Slide 3) Kelley, M. (2006) Infectious Diseases Research and Dual-Use Risk, Virtual Mentor 8(4). 230-234. Available from http://virtualmentor.ama-assn.org/2006/04/pfor1-0604.html (Slide 5) Kuhlau, F., Eriksson, S., Evers, K., and Hoglund, A. (2008) Taking Due Care: Moral Obligations in Dual Use Research, Bioethics 22(9) 477-487. Available from http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/121452418/abstract (Slide 8) Dando, M. R. (2009) ‘Bioethicists Enter the Dual-Use Debate’, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists 20 April. Available from http://www.thebulletin.org/webedition/columnists/malcolmdando/bioethicists-enter-the-dual-use-debate

24. Ehni, H-J. (2008). Dual Use and the Ethical Responsibility of Scientists Archivum Immunologiae et Therapiae Experimentalis 56(3) 147-152. Available from http://www.springerlink.com/content/vh61601545017112/ (Slide 13) Kuhlau, F., Hoglund, A., Evers, K., and Eriksson, S. (2009) A Precautionary Principle for Dual Use Research in the Life Sciences, Bioethics, [Early View] Available from http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/122499297/abstract (Slide 14) Somerville, M. A., and Atlas, R. A. (2005) Ethics: A Weapon to Counter Bioterrorism, Science 307(5717) 1881-1882. Available from http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/307/5717/1881 (Slide 17) Journal Editors and Authors Group. (2003) Uncensored Exchange of Scientific Results, PNAS 100(4) 1463-1464. Available from http://www.pnas.org/content/100/4/1464.full