Non-Existent Fashion Scruples

"[The Crocodylus niloticus listed under Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora is] threatened with extinction."
"Trade in specimens of these species is permitted only in exceptional circumstances."
The Washington Convention

"Morally, one has to wonder whether it's appropriate to be selling an item that so much cruelty has gone into producing."
"[The right thing to do would be to give it a proper burial or to destroy it] rather than sell it off and promote the idea that luxury bags made from brutally killed endangered animals are something desirable for society."
Camille Labchuk, animal rights lawyer, executive director, Animal Justice

Interior view of the crocodile-skin Birkin bag up for auction by the government of Canada. Public Services and Procurement Canada

In 1984 actress Jane Birkin happened to meet Hermes chairman Jean-Louis Dumas on a flight, according to Hermes publicity material. The actress informed the man who headed one of the most prestigious producers of handbags in France that her search for a stylish yet practical bag with enough room to carry baby bottles had eluded success. "No sooner said than done, the empathetic, clever Monsieur Dumas designs a deep and supple holdall", claimed the Hermes website. Not only did Jane Birkin get a bag to her specifications, but the bag itself was named in her honour.

At some later date when she became aware of the endangered species designation given to the very animals from which her bag and others like it were produced, she asked that her name be taken off the bag's identity. What happened to her original bag is perhaps not known; whether it saw the use she contemplated when she travelled with her little girl, or whether she set it aside for a more utilitarian, less celebrated label that worked just as well or even better than the one produced for her.

However, one of these bags modelled after her own and produced by Hermes had been seized by court order, forming part of a forfeiture, which is how it came into government hands in 2014. It has been retained in storage up to the present time, but was recently put up for auction by an agency specializing in selling surplus government items. Potential bidders had to make appointments to view the bag: "Walk-ins will be turned away", stated the government auction listing.

And the potential of bidding for the French designer bag was of necessity limited to those who could or would attempt its ownership through a minimum bid of $26,289. A whole lot of money for anyone to slap down for possession of a mere handbag. It is by necessity a plaything and proud possession of the moneyed and the unscrupulous. Celebrity bait. The bag is advertised as in pristine condition, a minor scratch on the interior lining.

An authentication letter accompanies it from an executive of the manufacturer established in New York, certifying its market value; approximately $30,000 -- and up. In 2017 just such a bag was sold at auction for an astonishing $380,000 by Christie's auction house in Hong Kong, proving in action that old maxim that too many people have more money than brains.

Another, sold more recently in London at christie's went for $300,000. As far as legalities are concerned there is little of issue in selling such a handbag since the purpose of the the Washington Convention is to prevent trade across borders, not within borders; added to which a personal effects exemption applies, into which category a handbag would likely fall.

Still, since the Nile crocodile is listed at the highest level in the international treaty restricting trade in endangered species, the government agency overseeing the sale of this item warns that whoever becomes the successful bidder, will be unable to export the bag without a special government permit. This bag, produced in Paris in 2011, in government hands for the past five years should have, as Ms. Labchuk suggested, been destroyed, in reflection of its unethical moral status.

Jane Birkin. Christophe Ena/AP file photo

DNR Tattoos

"The tattoo was such a dramatic display of rejection. I think this was someone who really didn't want to be resuscitated."
"The ethical standard is, you should do to an unconscious patient what they would want if they were conscious. But the problem with all advanced directives --even a document signed with a witness -- is that someone can change their mind at any time."
Dr. Kenneth Goodman, director, Institute for Bioethics and Health Policy, University of Miami

"Unless the Supreme Court says a tattoo is a legally binding document, then it's nothing more than an expression of emotion."
"A tattoo doesn't obligate a physician to not provide care if they don't have more information, and I wouldn't advise my colleagues to be worried that they'll have to justify their actions."
"When I read a document, I don't just say 'this is what I will or won't do' because DNRs are not black and white. People will write things like 'I'll be on dialysis but only for a week', so they think they've thought things through, but it's really more confusing for the physician."
"Things like better communication in hospitals need to be addressed, but I don't think [getting DNR tattoos] is the way to fix it."
Dr. Bojan Paunovic, executive member, Canadian Critical Care Society

"I would argue that in the absence of a clear indication that the tattoo represents a patient's current position, then the doctor would be well within their rights to proceed [in caring for the patient]."
Osborne Barnwell, lawyer, medical malpractices

One man's "Do not resuscitate' tattoo left doctors with no idea on how to react. New England Journal of Medicine

Dr. Paunovic points out that it has been his experience that many people have a change of attitude faced with a serious medical situation. Where they might have been convinced that they had no intention of permitting doctors in an emergency medical situation that looked grim in its outcome to use all possible technological and professional expertise to prolong a life not at that point worth preserving, when the actual moment arrives, they give it second thought, deciding that life is, after all, preferable to death; even a severely impaired life.

In 2012, an article describing a situation where a man who'd gone to the trouble of having a 'do not resuscitate' tattoo placed on his chest, irrespective of its prominence and the attitude it presented, really did want to be resuscitated. The reason for that article to have seen publication was to alert physicians that the tattoo had resulted from a lost poker bet. It did not in actual fact express the wishes of the man who wore it. Presumably the article did not need to delve into the inadvisability for anyone to recklessly display such an existential threat.

Yet this is the kind of thing that increasingly emergency room physicians are faced with, one that tests the ethical, moral framework of their profession What to do when such a tattoo is prominently placed on the body of a patient in extreme medical distress? Honour the tattoo as a significant authorized request to hold of on any extraordinary measures to save a life, or proceed, using every measure available to modern medical science to save the life of the individual expressing those sentiments?

This was an actual case that appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine recently, where doctors initially attempted to save the life of a man who had a tattoo on his chest. Addressing their uncertainty, in a desperate last minute appeal, the medical team queried an ethics counsellor and in the event made the decision to take the tattoo as an official endorsement of the man's wish to stop resuscitation efforts. Supporting documentation in the hospital's files were found, confirming the man's wishes. He died soon afterward.    

An increasing number of such mute, but highly legible attestations to intent are being seen in hospital emergency rooms. And Dr. Paunovic, an ICU physician, states that his attention would briefly fixate on the request, but it would take supporting documentation to convince him that the patient really did want resuscitation efforts to be withheld. Awareness of context, as far as Dr. Paunovic is concerned, is critical with any type of DNR order, inclusive of a signed document.

Joe Raedley / GettyImages

People do strange things. Could be that someone in a state of temporary depression decides to have a tattoo for DNR. They may change their minds, but tattoos are pretty close to permanent; their removal isn't conveniently and swiftly accomplished. The eradication process is time-consuming, expensive and painful as a procedure to undo what has been done when a change of mind occurs.                                                                                                                     

Unnatural Breeding

"Three healthy reclones of Snuppy are alive, and as with Snuppy we do not anticipate that the reclones will go through an accelerated rate of aging or will be more prone to develop diseases than naturally bred animals."
"Animal cloning has gained popularity as a method to produce genetically identical animals or superior animals for research or industrial uses."
South Korean scientists, report published in the journal Nature

"We do not imagine using these technologies for cloning humans."
"[The three puppies now about a year old] will be closely watched. Almost every aspect of their life will be measured -- their disease development, their immune system and growth and metabolism."
"[When Snuppy was born], the major concern was whether these guys [cloned dogs] would live [a natural life] or not."
"[Today], “there is lots of pet cloning going on right now. Owners are concerned whether their clones will live [a normal lifespan] or if they will experience accelerated aging and die early. So, there is some business concern."
CheMyong Jay Ko, University of Illinois

"[The] battle over humans [that will continue to surface through cloning will focus on genetic engineering, not pure replication]."
"What we'll see is more attempts to engineer humans [through gene-editing techniques like CRISPR]."
"There may be an occasional single oddball that wants to clone themselves to reproduce, but it’s going to be on the margins."
“If you have a lot of people cloning animals, it’s the same problem we have now — who’s going to want the stray or the mutt?"
"[And] If you’re paying a whole lot of money for a cloned dog, disappointment becomes a big issue around cloning because you’re paying for, ‘I want this product'.’ It makes them a little more like manufactured goods."
Arthur Caplan, Professor of Bioethics, Langone Medical Center, New York University

The three surviving reclones at two months of age. They were dervived by SCNT of adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cells (ASCs) taken from Snuppy at five years of age.  PST

Snuppy, the original Snuppy named for 'Seoul National University puppy', was born with the use of somatic cell nuclear transfer, in 2005. An embryo was created through the use of a nucleus removed from a somatic cell and transferred to an unfertilized egg, stripped of its own nucleus. The resulting embryo that was to become the world's first cloned dog, an Afghan Hound, was inserted into a surrogate female dog, to produce Snuppy. Who lived for ten years.

South Korean scientists recloned Snuppy with the use of stem cells taken from his body fat at five years of age. A special type of stem cells called mesenchymal cells, capable of differentiating to several types of cells were used to create Snuppy's clones. Taken from Snuppy's belly fat then frozen, to go through a thawing process recently, placed in a culture to grow, and injected into eggs( with their nucleus removed) from female canine donors. And then, as with the original, the cloned embryos transferred to surrogate female dogs to carry through gestation to birth.

The health of clones has been a matter of some controversy, that they were more susceptible to early onset of diseases. Snuppy, however was healthy until he developed cancer, just as his predecessor from whom the original stem cells were taken to produce Snuppy had. But ten years reflects the average lifespan of a large hound such as Afghans. According to the report the researchers published in Scientific Reports journal, the second generation of Snuppy clones will lead to a "new era" in studying the health and longevity of cloned animals.

Snuppy's predecessor-cloned animal, Dolly the sheep, died of the effects of severe osteoarthritis along with a disease of the lungs, at just six years old, representing half the normal expected lifespan for a Finn Dorset sheep. Birth defects have commonly been reported for some cloned puppies, as the researchers pointed out in their paper, published in Scientific Reports. On the other hand, other dogs that have been cloned were born defect-free and were able to reproduce naturally.

Afghan hounds have a mortality rate from cancer of 31 percent, while cancer is common in dogs of all breeds who contract a kind of cancer seen exclusively in dogs; hemanglosarcoma. When Snuppy's clones were created, a total of 94 retrofitted embryos had been transferred to recipient female dogs to carry through to birth. Four of them were born by Cesarean section, but It appears that only three survived.

Snuppy walks on the grass as South Korean stem cell researcher Dr. Hwang Woo-Suk announces the first successfully cloned Afghan hound at the Seoul National University on August 3, 2005 in Seoul, South Korea. Chung Sung-  Jun/Getty Images

 It was actually a discredited South Korean stem cell scientist, Hwang Woo-Suk, who pioneered the cloning of dogs. He had advanced himself as having created human stem cells from a cloned embryo, his claim causing a sensation in the world of science and bioethics. Until it was discovered that his research findings were faked. After experts in the field verified the reality of his work resulting in Snuppy, he now focuses on his Sooam Biotech Research Foundation specializing in dog cloning "No matter its age, size and breed", a purely commercial venture for which the rewards are high; up to $100,000 for a cloned puppy for grieving dog owners.

MAID: Medical Assistance in Dying and Organ Harvesting

"If we accept people can make decisions to end life, and we accept the idea of cardiac death being sufficient for organ donation, t his should be acceptable."
"The concern that comes up is, could the decision for one drive the decision for the other?"
"There's a lot riding on this. If somebody has organs that would be appropriate to donate, you'll never get better organs than you would by this process [harvest post-] MAID."
Dr. James Downar, co-chair, Canadian Blood Services committee organ donation guidelines

"This [feeling compelled to pursue decision] is a theoretical possibility. Imagine a situation where the workup is done -- people have gone out and done the medical tests and found the recipients and set everything up. And then you change your mind."
"One wonders if perhaps that might create pressure to continue with the MAID. It would be very important in these scenarios to make it very clear to people that they can change their mind at any time -- that someone shouldn't stick with MAID just because they feel an obligation, having set the process in motion."
"I'm torn between a sense of, is it any harm to let people know [the donor died by assisted death]? After all, if it really bothers them, there will be someone else who will benefit greatly from this donation. They will just bypass the person who objects and go to the next."
Jennifer Chandler, professor, centre for health law, policy and ethics, University of Ottawa

"I think it's really important we keep the public's trust, in all of this."
"We have to be transparent. And it has to be clear that the two must be kept separate, that there is no pressure to go for MAID to procure organs [for transplantation]."
"[The terminally ill] may feel they would better serve society by dying and saving other people's lives." 
Dr. Marie-Chantal Fortin, transplant nephrologist, Centre hospitalier de l'Universite de Montreal

Medical team performing surgery on patient who had undergone medically assisted suicide. Getty Images

The conventional major source of transplant organs has been people who have been declared "brain dead", where patients are removed from ventilators and similar life support mechanisms meant to keep hearts and lungs functioning. Live-donor donations have more recently become another means to produce organs for transplant, when people decide to voluntarily donate pieces of their liver or a lung out of a sense of public duty and charity sometimes related to a specific patient, sometimes altruistically.

The Canadian medical community has recently adopted a practise of urging organ donation after cardiac death involving people on life support for whom the chance of recovery is medically dim. When life support is withdrawn and the heart stops beating, a five- to 10-minute "no touch" period ensues, after which the organ/s can be harvested. Because death takes its time; up to two to three hours; vital organs such as the heart and lungs begin deteriorating, resulting from lack of blood flow and oxygen.

When assisted dying is involved, organs have the potential of being retrieved swiftly once the heart stops within two to three minutes of the injection. What troubles ethicists, however, is the coupling of assisted death and organ donations. What is also to be considered is whether those organ recipients whose moral or religious objections to euthanasia entitles them to be informed that the organ offer has come from someone who chose an medically assisted death. In most instances cause of death is not routinely revealed, such as in the case of suicide, barring a valid medical reason for disclosure.

Even so, the pool of organs to be transplanted from those undergoing medically assisted dying is not a large one, given that most patients requesting assisted dying are suffering from advanced stages of cancer, making their organs transplant-unsuitable. Those, however, suffering from neurological disorders such as multiple sclerosis, have organs that are good candidates for transplant. Over 4,500 people were awaiting an organ donation in Canada in 2014, and from among them 278 died, while waiting for a transplant that never materialized.

So far, in Ontario, 26 people who chose to die by lethal injection have been donors of tissue or organs since decriminalization was passed last June. Since that time, 338 people have died through medical assistance altogether, in the province. Tissue donations represent eyes, skin, heart valves, bones and tendons. Experts feel that those who qualify for aid in dying could gain a sense of psychological comfort in the knowledge they have, through donating their organs, saved someone else's life.

And that comes up hard against those concerned that organ donation decisions might place pressure on those who qualify for assisted death. The issue appears to be, should someone agree to donate their organs, would they feel compelled by those circumstances involving the health and life of other people, to continue the procedure of assisted dying even though they may have decided they would prefer not to proceed?

Two countries that have long since legalized medically assisted death requests -- Belgium and the Netherlands -- appear to have solved the dilemma of their own concerns relating to the issue, and have long harvested organs after euthanasia. Infamously, China operates a thriving organ transplant/tourism 'business' in organs harvested from prisoners who have somehow died while incarcerated. The country stands accused of harvesting organs from still-living prisoners, as well.

“MAID (medical aid in dying) has the potential to provide additional organs available for transplantation. Accepting to procure organ donation after MAID is a way to respect the autonomy of patients, for whom organ donation is an important value. Organ donation after MAID would be ethically acceptable if the patient who has offered to donate is competent and not under any external pressure to choose MAID or organ donation”. Julie Allard and Marie-Chantal Fortin, bioethicists at the University of Montreal

Fears of Creating a Monster Animal Cross-over

"The first concern is public perception: does it violate some notion of boundaries, or the natural order of things."
"You're going to have to watch carefully what is happening during the course of development, and be ready to shut down something that looks like it's an unintentional outcome."
"Can you control where these cells go. There's less worry about growing an islet cell to help somebody with diabetes than there is finding out human cells migrated into the animal's brain and grew some structures there."
"It doesn't mean that the animal is all of a sudden going to wake up and sign up to take a bioethics course. It just means there are some human cells in there."
"But still, that bothers us more because that's where we think the mental states that identify our identity are."
"Most people don't say, well, the way I know who I am is by thinking about the cells that are in my pancreas or spleen or something. But we do when it comes to the brain."
"Forget about [the Salk researchers'] work. What if somebody said, 'I think it would be interesting or fun to see what would happen if I did try to make a pig with some element of a human brain'?"
Arthur Caplan, bioethicist, Langone Medical Center, New York University

 "...And in some of them [hybrid human-pig embryos], we observed human cells were there. They turned into the progenitors for many different tissues and organs."
"And these organs will probably function better than the organs we've already had for 30 or 40 years. We might have the ability [through harvesting chimera organs] to rejuvenate our physiology."
Jun Wu, Salk Institute scientist

"This [research succeeding in creating human-pig chimera embryos] required a tour de force. But in the end we were able to answer a key question -- can human cells grow in an animal."
"The ultimate goal is to grow functional and transplantable tissue or organs, but we are far away from that. This is an important first step." 
"It's like when you try to duplicate a key. The duplicate looks almost identical, but when you get home, it doesn't open the door. There is something we are not doing right."
"We thought growing human cells in an animal would be much more fruitful. We still have many things to learn about the early development of cells."
Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, lead investigator, Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, California

This photograph shows injection of human iPS cells into a pig blastocyst. A laser beam (green circle with a red cross inside) was used to perforate an opening to the outer membrane (Zona Pellucida) of the pig blastocyst to allow easy access of an injection needle delivering human iPS cells. Credit: Courtesy of Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte

But part of that goal has been achieved, according to research resulting in the successful pilot creation of a human-pig hybrid and described in a publication appearing in the scientific journal Cell, this week. Although lead researcher in this project, Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte modestly cautioned that there is much left to learn on how to proceed from this point, the first hurdle has been set aside. Scientists have been attempting for quite awhile to grow inter-species embryos; this is the first to date to succeed.

And the first successful 'chimera', an animal created with parts of different animals which owes its legendary presence to ancient folklore, has been developed. The goal in this development is to eventually solve the intractable problem of procuring enough body parts to be used for transplants when original body parts have failed due to disease or other functionality compromising factors. Ultimately perhaps even replacing worn out viscera in an aging human body to gain additional years of life for the recipient.

A 4-week-old pig embryo that was injected with human stem cells. The experiment was a very early step toward the possibility of growing human organs inside animals for transplantation. Salk Institute via AP

Up to now the creation of animals in their various forms has been a monopoly practised by the ultimate creatrix, Nature. It can perhaps be viewed as the last word in hubris for humans to devise biological methods by which nature can not only be emulated but manipulated in ways never meant to occur by natural means. And this dabbling about in nature's preserve raises concerns of bioethicists: "But of course the more we humanize an animal, the more we raise questions about animal ethics", pointed out Timothy Caulfield, Canada Research Chair in health law and policy.

The article published in Cell described how researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies injected human stem cells into pig embryos in an experiment they hoped would result in the stem cells which have the capacity to become any other type of cell the body harbours, to mature to the point where they could eventually be harvested, and used to regenerate damaged or diseased tissue in a human subject on transplantation.

But this research is still at its dawn stage and many technical elements of the strategy are yet to be explored and refined. The researchers aspire to be able to inject human stem cells into a fertilized pig egg so that a given organ can be developed for transplantation into a waiting human whose organ has failed and requires a replacement. After the fetus is born, the animal is to be raised until the organ reaches optimum size for harvesting and transplantation.

The researchers envision pig farms reflecting a "clinical grade" of environment, to incubate the human organs. Dr. Wu points out the obvious, that any organ generated in a pig will be a 'young' organ, one that will function as a young organ, in contrast to one that has been in use in a human body for many years and whose life expectancy for usefulness has become compromised by age. Another plus would be that the body's immune response would not be called into rejection action since the organ would have been grown from the individual's own cells.

Ethicists, in a paper published in Stem Cell Research & Therapy, last year warned that a worrying worst-case scenario "would be that a pig producing human sperm could incidentally mate with a sow or vice versa". The very thought of a "humanized pig brain", sends shudders down the spines of ethicists. Though the concern of a man-pig child emerging is beyond remote, considering the "interspecies reproductive barrier is strong", concerns yet remain.

Challenge Nature's Character Designs : And Then, What?

"Five or ten years ago the evidence seemed to suggest oxytocin was just this universally good thing -- that if we just dosed everybody up with oxytocin they'd all be walking around like love puddles."
"We no longer consider ADHD a moral failing because we've medicalized that moral failing. And that is part of what moral enhancement is about -- to recognize the natural diversity of brains, and that some of us are just born with a poor roll of the dice that doesn't give us enough self-control, executive function or capacity for compassion or moral cognition."
"The world will be happier; we'll probably all be happier."
"[Or] We could end up in a world where every kind of political or moral deviance is subject to some kind of mandatory treatment."
James Hughes, executive director, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, Willington, Connecticut

"The reality is that there is not much out there that allows us to do these sorts of things. Look at the miserable failure that is modern psychiatry. We just don't really understand how the brain works."
"But it's also true they're making progress in leaps and bounds, and I have personally no doubt that these kinds of drugs will eventually exist."
"Your gut response would be, well this would be a pleasant place to be. But what if the country next to us did the exact opposite, and invested in drugs that made their compatriots more aggressive, more competitive?"
"How do we decide that constitutes a moral deficiency? Who should be allowed to make these decisions about what is good and what is bad?"
Udo Schuklenk, bioethicist, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario

Fotolia    Ethicists warn that a pill to make people more "moral" could pave the way to a world where every bad act begets chemical treatment, voluntary or not.

Most people -- at least those who use their cerebral capacity to observe and to hope to achieve a moral balance within themselves to better reflect the positive elements of human nature -- make a well-considered effort to observe standards of thought and behaviour consonant with self-respect, to become a part of the social contract that urges individuals to think of others even as they think of themselves, to achieve the golden rule of moderation in all things, and to emulate a well-known pattern of moral behaviour while feeling empathy for those whose condition in life stifles them.

At the same time we are very well aware that among us live other people who have no intention of succumbing to an iota of compassionate attitude toward the unfortunate of the world, and look only to advancing their own lives to acquire wealth and social position and in some instances, power. These are the manipulators who feel entitled to investing all their energies and using any means seen as useful to promoting themselves to arrive at their ego-laden destiny. Move down the scale a little further and the sociopaths and psychopaths appear, those against whom civilization guards itself.

With another turning into yet another new year, people look at themselves to appraise where they appear on the judgement scale, and many vow to change certain elements of their character and values and priorities, and behaviour in the hope of improving themselves to match self-set standards. Usually, those promises-to-self, earnestly arrived at and with full intention of reaching those goals fade with the passage of time as we resort to old habits, comforting ourselves with the assurance that we're not so bad the way we are, after all.

What if all this rigmarole could be by-passed by the simple expedient of using an engineered chemical meant to steer our natures toward making better choices for ourselves, to make us more moral, caring and careful individuals without breaking a sweat? Just such ideas are the precinct of neuroethicists enthralled with the idea that altering the chemical balance and hormones that people are naturally endowed with, by the use of prescribed artificial enhancements could make of us all the people we strive to be proud of.

Who imagine that pharmaceuticals, implanted brain electrodes and/or other types of bio-medical means should be promoted to alter society to make us less selfish and self-absorbed, more attuned to the world around us and how we may better live our lives while at the same time being valued members of a co-operative society. Thoughts of tamping down aggression and other emotions that make people anti-social appears to attract those who believe in the efficacy of such interventions

Proponents of moral enhancement through such means point to the technical advances that science has enabled the world for good and for ill. Technology allows us to live with the kind of comfort and communication, ease and stress that has catapulted the world toward a tighter global community. Yet it is also one that issues threats and commits deplorable acts of violence, reducing opportunities for those who are tyrannized and forced to live in penury. With the larger threat of weapons of mass destruction capable of annihilating populations and laying the world to utter ruin.

So, if bioenhancement could be undertaken on a universal scale we could, in theory, become more decent, moral and responsible, to ourselves and to others. Those who value free will and the capability to make their own personal decisions, to be responsible and responsive, won't regard that potential with welcoming assent. They may have achieved a laudable moral plateau distinguishing them from others who have no intention of so doing. And those whose character disposition is venal and controlling would see no reason to alter the way they are, giving them great satisfaction as despots.

At the present time people use prescribed drugs for other purposes; high blood pressure and depression, where antidepressants such as SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors), along with drugs affecting the release or metabolism of oxytocin, known as the love and bonding hormone are already involved in moral modification through the auspices of the drugs, yet they are not fully aware of the effects such drugs have on them. In a 2013 study, 40 healthy volunteers were given the high blood pressure drug propranolol, resulting in men and women being steered toward judging harmful actions as being morally unacceptable.

This is a drug whose use increased a natural aversion to doing harm to others, as well. SSRIs, in addition, seem to act on people to make them more trusting of others. Yet a 2014 Princeton University study concluded people given oxytocin were likelier than others not taking the drug to engage in "group-serving dishonesty", where they took to lying often and more spontaneously, in a concerted effort to bring benefit to the group they represented. Trifling perhaps, in comparison to altering the character of psychopaths.

"They're so far off out of the norm that maybe bringing them back to the norm would be generally understood to be advantageous", offered Brian Earp, associate director of the Yale-Hastings program in ethics and health policy at Yale University. "...You might take a pill that makes you more susceptible to, or find more compelling the sorts of moral lessons you're already engaged in", he offered. Unless we just decided to work with greater deliberation on our own initiative, under our own agency, without artificial chemicals, to achieve a lifetime goal of decency.

What if all it took to make you a better human was a little pill? -- Postmedia files

Raising a Child in Creaky Old-Age

"[Critics speak of post-menopausal mothers as] gross, unnatural and selfish [as] bad [mothers flaunting] the social norms surrounding motherhood -- where the good mother is construed as young, beautiful, energetic and selfless."
"There's a lot more social disapproval, it seems, against older mothers than older fathers."
Angel Petropanagos, ethicist, feminist philosopher, Dalhousie University

"[For some women who decide to bear a child in their very mature years] life got in the way and they decided to make babies later."
"Some are in new relationships and they're trying to build a child that's unique to that relationship."
"We want some kind of caregiver for this child. Even if it's same-sex females or same-sex males, you'd like to know that at least one of them is going to be around longer [to raise the child]."
Dr. Ari Baratz, chair, Ontario Medical Association reproductive biology section

"Ultimately, I think we all recognize that the concept of stopping [fertility] treatment at a certain point makes sense."
"The tricky part is where, exactly, to draw the line, [denying in vitro treatment to an older woman] given that any cutoff, no matter where it's drawn, is on some level arbitrary."
Dr. Neal Mahutte, medical director, Montreal Fertility Centre

Fotolia      In Toronto, owing to the marvels of artificial procreation, a mother who qualifies for the seniors menu at Denny’s is raising a 19-month-old toddler

Bioethicist Arthur Caplan, head of medical ethics at New York University's Langone Medical Center, feels that the ubiquity and influence of social media and celebrity worship has some part to play in women of very mature years deciding to bear their first child, despite those mature years. He calls the syndrome "television optimism", a view of mature women deluded into thinking that why not? If, for example, Janet Jackson at 50 could decide to have her first child, it's feasible and appropriate for them too.

"Of course, what isn't said, is 'I have seven nannies and a chauffeur", pointed out Dr. Caplan. Backup of a nature that most people cannot rely upon, only the wealthy. According to fertility experts the chances of natural conception descends precipitously to below one in 1,000 by the time a woman turns 45 years of age. Despite living longer and living better it was pointed out, creeping old age does alter us. "The odds are that you will encounter a health problem that is very significant over 65", cautioned Dr. Caplan.

AFP/Getty

The singer is reportedly pregnant

There's also the issue of the male side of genetic health conferred on a child by its father. Older couples tend to prefer to use the male partner's sperm with a donor egg when they undergo in vitro fertilization. Growing evidence links advanced paternal age of fifty or greater with chromosomal abnormalities like Down syndrome. And there exists an increased risk of autism and schizophrenia developing in a child born to older parents.

However, as Dr. Jeffrey Roberts, president-elect of the Canadian Fertility and Andrology Society and medical director for the Pacific Centre for Reproductive Medicine in Burnaby, British Columbia points out: "We're getting requests and situations where ethically, we're a little bit torn. It's a complicated topic". One that fertility doctors in Canada are experiencing difficulty in reaching a consensus over in agreement on a specific age cutoff.

The reality is that the number of babies born to women 50 and older in Canada is on the increase. One hundred-forty-five live births were registered to women aged 50 and older between 2010 and 2012. In comparison there were just fifteen such births in the years 2001 to 2003, according to Statistics Canada. Past the age of 47 there are very few instances where women are able to use their own eggs with the technique of in vitro fertilization; donor eggs are depended upon.

Dr. Baratz, a reproductive endocrinologist and infertility specialist at the CReATe Fertility Centre in Toronto, while not the woman's doctor, works out of the same clinic that assisted a woman in Toronto to give birth at age 56 using donor eggs and donor sperm, in 2014. Clinics are not obliged by law to collect or report statistics so it isn't known whether this woman represents the oldest Canadian woman to give birth with donor eggs and sperm through in vitro fertilization.

The woman who holds the world title for agedness and birth, is Daljinder Kaur who at 72, gave birth to a healthy boy with the use of anonymous donor eggs, in India. Most fertility specialists feel that whoever it was who professionally guided the 72-year-old through a pregnancy and birth process did her and her son no favours, while using them both as a experiment in the possible.

NARINDER NANU/AFP/Getty Images   Indian father Mohinder Singh Gill, 79, and his wife Daljinder Kaur, 72, pose for a photograph as they hold their newborn baby boy Arman at their home in Amritsar on May 11, 2016.

Without legal guidelines the door is wide open for medical and human relations catastrophes since egg donation makes it a possibility for a woman of any age with a uterus to carry a baby with the use of eggs from a fertile, younger woman. And until such guidelines are in place and functioning, the for-profit fertility industry claims women between 50 and 60 conceiving with the use of donor eggs can expect "acceptable outcomes".

They are, though, at increased risk of pre-eclampsia (rapid and potentially life-threatening high blood pressure) and gestational diabetes. And here are those little details over whether a woman in advanced years, even a healthy one with no existing health problems, has the patience and the skills to nurture and raise an infant. And how long she will live without a chronic illness requiring care herself, taking her personal care away from a child she is raising.

So yes, it definitely is a selfish decision for a woman past 45 to take on pregnancy and childbirth.

A Bioethical Conundrum

"They'll have all the embryos transferred, so they can die in the uterus."
"[The decision to discard unused embryos can be] gut-wrenching. They [couples attempting conception through in vitro fertilization] think of those embryos as related in some way to the children that they have."
"If we have this idea that embryos are something that need respect, we should have clarity about what to do with them in a long-term way."
"It might not be in the best interest of society to keep human embryos frozen in storage forever -- and ever and ever."
Alana Cattapan, post-doctoral fellow, faculty of medicine, Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia 

"None of us like dealing with the abandoned embryo issue — it’s difficult for us, it’s not an easy decision."
"The important thing is to define, right up front, what to do if the couple no longer wants to take care of the embryos. There has to be absolute clarity with the couple from the beginning — 'if you walk away from this and nobody can reach you, here is what we are forced into doing down the road'."Dr. Matt Gysler, past president, Canadian Fertility and Andrology Society

Mauricio Lima/AFP/Getty Images   When fertility clinics end up with a build-up of unclaimed embryos, a dilemma has been ensuing: How do doctors ensure there's space for existing patients while balancing the ethics of 'disposing' of the building blocks of human life? One doctors' group's solution? Just let them thaw out.

Unused and stored embryos are not just any waste human tissue to be casually disposed of; they have risen well beyond the building blocks of human life, representing nascent human beings simply awaiting transplantation into a woman's uterus to be given the opportunity to grow into a foetus, to become a baby cherished by parents eager to welcome an infant into their hearts and their home. But in the process of producing these embryos meant for multiple transfer but for one reason or another considered to be redundant, they have been left in storage.

But is it for posterity, when the prospective parents decide for any number of reasons not to proceed with their  use? This is an issue troubling ethicists and the businesses of offering IVF (in vitro fertilization) services to a public which values the opportunity to conceive a child through methods that owe more to the laboratory and medical science than to nature's plan for conception, foetal maturation and birth.

Up to a third of patients undergoing cycles of IVF will end up in possession of excess embryos, which is to say more than can be safely transferred, leading to the recognition that more embryos are produced than are necessary for the process at hand. Two scholars out of Dalhousie University in Halifax have published their research findings with the recommendation that Canada take heed of how the United Kingdom, Denmark and New Zealand consider the legality of fertility clinics discarding embryos which no one claims after five or ten  years.

Reasonable effort should have been made in outreach in the absence of no clear written direction how to settle the existence and disposal of embryos whose use is no longer required for reproduction. They might be the possession of those who have completed fertility treatment, or abandoned their treatment, or simply stopped paying storage fees and cannot bring themselves to deciding what to do with the embryos. The opportunity to offer the embryos for transplant to another couple might be offered.

Without a clear legal mandate, clinics are placed in a position where the way forward is lacking; whether to legally be entitled to dispose of the frozen embryos which remain unclaimed, or whether to have to continue storing them on an indefinite basis. Clinics hesitate to act without precise instructions from the people who own the embryos. Sometimes they are loathe to act even when they are in possession of prior instructions on how to proceed.

Dalhousie University bioethicist Francoise Baylis and Alana Cattapan recently published their findings and recommendations in Reproduction Biomedicine & Society Online. "There is no governance of abandoned embryos at the federal, provincial and territorial levels [in Canada]" they wrote. According to Dr. Heather Shapiro, president of the Canadian Fertility and Andrology Society, precise figures are unknown. "I don't think we should assume it's an epidemic, nor should we assume it's a non-issue."

Estimates exist in the United States that 400,000 to 1.4-million embryos are in an abandoned state, but there are no reliable figures, let alone reasonable estimates for Canada, to indicate the number of abandoned embryos in existence. One 2003 study revealed 15,615 frozen embryos in Canada. Since that time, however, another ten fertility clinics have been in operation and logically a plenitude of additional embryos were created and frozen.

Clinics have been incorporating genetic testing of embryos to determine which are the healthiest to be selected for transfer; a process that eliminates large numbers of embryos frozen as 'spares' in case they're needed. And, in an effort to bring solace and closure to the issue of expendable embryo decision-making, some clinics in the United States offer to implant unused embryos into the IVF patient's uterus when there is little likelihood of it resulting in a successful pregnancy, as a method of disposal.

Objecting Conscientiously

"The whole idea of basically sending them [patients in morbid end-of-life decline] to their death, I abhor."
"[Families already have asked] what about this euthanasia legislation [in Canada]? They would say, 'what do you think about it? And, if mom starts having a lot of suffering, can we count on you to be the provider?"
"I loved my patients. I feel very strongly people are a precious commodity. I thought, 'I don't want to be faced with this'."
Dr. Nancy Naylor, family physician, Strathroy, Ontario

"The prohibition against assisting someone to commit suicide is millennia old. You don't just strike out those conscientious beliefs with the stroke of a pen after they've existed for hundreds and hundreds of years."
Jay Cameron, lawyer, Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms

"The idea that doctors are somehow special and that their private views matter more than doing their jobs is ridiculous. [ The Hippocratic oath is] a very old document written by members of a Greek sect, with its own peculiar history [with no legitimate bearing on the practise of modern medicine. It isn't fit for today's purpose, and even if it was, those deploying it as a means to avoid providing particular professional services pick and choose only those bits they agree with and ignore the rest."
"It seems weird that  you would choose to become a professional in a particular discipline voluntarily, you know the scope of practice can be changed by society. And then you turn around and tell people in that society that enabled you to do all these things, 'Stuff you, because, quite frankly, my private beliefs are so much more important'."
Udo Schuklenk, bioethicist, Queen's University

Dr. Schuklenk has no sympathy whatever with the private consciences of physicians and other health-providers who will be called upon to participate in Canada's new assisted suicide laws guaranteeing the escape of death to people whose health has failed catastrophically leaving them with no future other than a continued steep descent into the finality of death. There are many such health providers who wince in pain at the very prospect of this law coming into full regulatory force.

These physicians and other health practitioners who will be expected to use their medical expertise and the trust that patients hold them in, to usher patients with hopeless medical conditions toward death on request feel instinctively that this will transform them from healers to killers, and they refuse to either condone or participate in the new protocol of euthanasia. Even that part of the protocol that would permit them to step away from active participation by referring to another doctor who has no such qualms horrifies them.

The manner in which such protocols have spiralled into the kind of use that has granted legally-assisted death to people who simply are sick of life, people who refuse to compromise with reduced quality of life, including accepting the death wishes of children whose lives are painful torments rather than proffer to them, as needy patients, all the survivability that medical science can offer with palliative care, stuns these objectors.

Dr. Schuklenk and a colleague Ricardo Smalling have written a paper published in the Journal of Medical Ethics that no regulated and lawful health system should permit any doctors to choose to be exempt from taking professional part in assisted suicide, that their pleas for accommodation should be rejected. "In more rural communities you could easily have 100 percent conscientious objectors", he pointed out.

On the other hand, the Canadian Medical Association feels that his argument is strictly in the realm of pure theory "Until I hear of an example that, in such-and-such a place there are ten doctors and none of them want to participate, then I would say we just don't have evidence that will happen", was the tart rejoinder by Dr. Jeff Blackmer, head of medical professionalism at the CMA, rejecting that defense of Dr. Schuklenk's contention.

The perspective of Dr. Brad Burke is that voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicide had not even remotely entered the conversation when he began medical school in 991. "No one ever thought this could happen." This Windsor Ontario physician practices medicine and rehabilitation, treating people suffering the aftermath of severe strokes, spinal cord injuries and head trauma. The very health demographic he feels representing those who could very well "ask me to kill them, or refer to someone who would."

Tyler Brownbridge / Windsor Star    Dr. Brad Burke argues assisted suicide and voluntary euthanasia were nowhere on the horizon when he entered medical school in 1991. 'No one ever thought this would happen.'

"I believe that everyone is created in the image of God. I have no problem trying to do my best to care for patients and to be compassionate. I just don't feel killing them is compassionate", he added. He renewed his medical licence in Michigan this year, where assisted suicide is illegal. As for Dr. Naylor, a practising physician for the last 37 years, with this new law coming into effect, she feels she has no option but to hang her shingle up high on a shelf to gather the dust of regret.

Making A Life-Altering Decision

"It is quite amazing the stories I am hearing. I am totally blown away by it, and I am not going to claim I totally understand it. It is a remarkable thing these people are doing [offering part of their liver as a donor for life-saving transplant]."
"[The transplant] ... could happen as early as tomorrow if the conditions were met, or it could be next week. We don't have weeks to conclude this We are looking at days, maybe a week at most. We know we have to move at a rapid pace."
Dr. Gary Levy, medical director, live donor liver transplant program, Toronto General Hospital

Peter J. Thompson/National Post/Files   A kidney transplant. “We can’t have public policy subverted by those who have the capacity to shout the loudest,” one expert in bioethics says.

Yesterday, a public notice was published in an Ottawa newspaper by the city's NHL hockey team, asking for people willing to donate part of their liver to save the life of the owner of the Ottawa Senators hockey team in a live liver operation, to step forward. Usually such donations come from the deceased who have indicated their wish that their organs be used to benefit other people in desperate need of organ replacement donations.

It is a lot to ask of anyone, close family members included, to risk potential death, injury or a long, complicated recovery as a result of offering part of their liver. To broadcast an appeal to the public at large to make such a sacrifice, anonymously, to benefit a stranger, is highly unusual and is a reflection of the shortage of donor organs from cadavers. Evidently the man in question is facing imminent death with the total collapse of his liver function.

That man is Eugene Melnyk, the founder of a generic Canadian pharmaceutical company, an immensely wealthy man who is also the owner of the city of Ottawa's hockey team. It appears that Mr. Melnyk is well known in the Ukrainian community for his philanthropy within that community. There was an instant response to the plea for people to step forward to aid this man; some two thousand people did just that.

Mr. Melnyk has a rare blood type which would have to be matched under usual circumstances, but which could be waived or manoeuvred around with a live donor where success is more prevalent than with cadaver organs. Those who volunteer for such a surgery transferring a large part of their liver to another person, without which that person would die, must undergo stringent examinations and interviews to ensure they are healthy and of sound mind.

That there are so many potential volunteers from such a large pool representing people moved by the plight of this man augurs well for a successful transplant and the longevity of Eugene Melnyk. There are issues involved in this situation; not the least of which is placing prospective donors into a situation which could prove dangerous to their own heath and longevity. The other involves the fact that as a man with immense wealth Mr. Melnyk could very well 'buy' a liver from a donor in India or China.

He and his family have chosen the ethical route; to pay someone to sacrifice an organ or part of an organ for transplant is illegal in Canada, and for obvious reasons. Desperately poor people in deprived conditions living in emerging economies where poverty is endemic see selling their organs as a way to sustain their own lives in another way; paying for the necessities of life for themselves through such a sacrifice.

Dr. Levy had vetted the public announcement of Mr. Melnyk's dire medical condition before its release by the NHL team's leadership: "I thought it was very professionally crafted and compassionate" he said, in view of strict rules on the solicitation of live organ donations. "But reaching out and telling people that you are sick and you need help, we would welcome this", he explained.

Not everyone agrees: "This is wading into a ethically very complex situation" pointed out Dr. Steve Paraskevas a transplant surgeon working out of McGill, president of the Canadian Society of Transplantation. Mr. Melnyk's case could have the effect of arousing public debate on the requirement for increased organ donors, but it might just as well, "create a negative impression about organ donation and the ability of certain people to harness resources that are not available to every individual".

His point is well taken, in that Mr. Melnyk is a public figure of some note and influence. His profile among sport fans is high, and he is no doubt admired by many of them who might wish to respond positively, in an effort to aid him, simply because of who he is. This is a course of action which, pursued by any other ordinary person in such a plight, might not elicit the same kind of public reaction.

Dr. Levy himself explains that many transplant centres feel uncomfortable with live liver donations: "We are talking about a life-threatening operation, albeit a life-saving one. Many people don't feel comfortable with that." On the other hand, he said, he and the hospital initiated live donations in view of a shortfall of organs from deceased donors: "We were losing 40 to 50 percent of recipients. We had to make a decision."

Interpretive Faith

"An exemption cannot be withheld on the basis that Loyola must teach Catholicism and Catholic ethics from a neutral perspective."
"To ask a religious school's teachers to discuss other religions and their ethical beliefs as objectively as possible does not seriously harm the value underlying religious freedom. These features of the ERC [ethics and religious culture course] Program are essential to achieving its objectives."
"But preventing a school like Loyola from teaching and discussing Catholicism in any part of the program from its own perspective does little to further those objectives while at the same time seriously interfering with the values underlying religious freedom."
Supreme Court of Canada ruling

"Every single judge is entirely behind the idea that Loyola as a Catholic school should be allowed to teach its religion and its  ethical system without ceasing to be who they are, kind of thing."
Mark Phillips, lawyer, Loyola High School, Montreal

Loyola High School, a private boys school in Montreal founded by Jesuits, aims to teach with a Catholic perspective. The school sought an exemption from Quebec's wider curriculum on ethics and religious culture. (CBC)

"I think more than anything there was a question of principle behind this and the idea of saying that you cannot be Catholic for whatever period of time during the day [when you're teaching the ERC course], that's where the problem was that the government should mandate that."
Paul Donovan, former principal, Loyola High School 

"However, it is important to underline that the Supreme Court confirmed the validity of the ethics and religious culture course, even in private religious schools."
"The course will always be taught in all Quebec schools."
Francois Blais, Quebec Education Minister

How realistic is it really in a free and democratic society to expect that a religion -- any religion -- can be expected to teach impressionable young people who attend religion-mandated school courses that their religion is no different in essence than any of the world's other religions. It is a nice, cozy thought that all religions should be regarded as having equal validity to the people who worship at their altars and believe them to be exceptional, but this is not the way that religious ideology works.

People do believe in exceptionalism; it is why, after all, there is such a wide range of religions reflecting cultures, traditions, heritage and customs that 'fit' all the parameters of a larger social contract giving human groups comfort in the belief that their religious traditions express a closer contact with god, than do others and in a manner they are most comfortable with. That people should be familiar with the basic tenets of other religions to be informed is another matter altogether.

So the idea behind Quebec's compulsory ethics and religious culture course as enacted by the province's Education Department is a sound one, but not as it was mandated, that the course be taught in a strictly secular, neutral manner, by all schools, even schools that have their own religion-mandated values and principles. And so because the province insisted that this be the case, Loyola, a private Catholic boys' school went to court for an exemption.

And the Supreme Court ruled in their favour in the sense that the ERC course which equates all world religions and ethics through the lens of secular distance goes a tad too far in interfering with a religious institution's freedom to teach its own religion in a manner consonant with its faith. Though the major objective of the course is to ensure that people recognize other religions and give equal respect to all in pursuit of a common goal, its outcome as mandated, would have neutralized the Catholic message.

A course teaching other religions, doing so in an even manner with no favour to one over the other, nor criticism of one against the other in an objectively secular manner makes sense in a public atmosphere absent a religious bias but somewhat less so in a religious institution which has a most definite religious bias, as how could it not have given the divisions in the substance of thought and belief between all the various religions?

If each religion is to be given its just due within a secular society that at an intellectual distance respects each equally, then each should be respected sufficiently to acknowledge that it will teach its own religion from its own perspective, then go on to teach about other religious beliefs from that neutral perspective so favoured by the Education Ministry.

The entire point of the exercise was to ensure that young people growing to maturity in a pluralistic society not be taught that one source of ethics, one religious devotion is inferior to another; merely different in approach to a broader, common belief in religious faith.

Suffering What Consequences?

"Toth did not have appropriate oversight of the data coming out of his lab. The result was a finding of a breach of research integrity."
"[Investigators] could neither verify nor dispute [whether Dr. Cory Toth's laboratory staff provided him with figures that weren't already manipulated without his knowledge. However, they found that his actions reflect a failure to adequately supervise and examine the work conducted in his lab."
"The faculty did investigate, which led to the retraction of the submitted paper and one paper already published."
Dr. Glenda MacQueen, vice-dean, University of Calgary medical school

"I can't say whether it's an official record, but we haven't seen anyone else in Canada retract that many papers since we launched in 2010."
Dr. Ivan Oransky, co-founder, Retraction Watch

Dr. Cory Toth spend nine years at the University of Calgary medical school. During that time, the man who was the research director of the Calgary Chronic Pain Centre Clinic was the recipient of over $2.3-million in research funding. And he was a prolific researcher, a celebrated doctor whose reputation was unassailable. Now, however, because an investigation discovered "manipulated" data and figures emanating from his laboratory at the medical school, he was forced to retract reports from the medical literature.

Grant Black / Postmedia News    Dr. Cory Toth, who is a celebrated doctor, has had to retract nine University of Calgary studies that contained bogus data.

What happens to the impeccable reputation of a doctor given great responsibility reflected by his presumed knowledge when it is discovered that under his imprimatur respectable journals have published research findings that prove to be constructed on a flimsy scaffolding of data? A brief flurry of embarrassment and awkward attempts to rectify the situation. The embarrassment, it would appear, is not Dr. Toth's, but the university medical school's of which he was such an integral part.

Retraction Watch, a U.S.-based group whose purpose is to cast light upon some within academia's corridors of high repute choice to take short-cuts in research where they manage to manipulate and manoeuvre data to fit their theories -- rather than find good solid reproducible methods of discovery to support their theories, then publish the results honourably, enabling those in the field to do their own research based on the published methodology and its proven results -- revealed his ethical lack.

Dr. Toth did what he had no option but to do thereafter; resigned, after investigators with the university confirmed he had faked data in no fewer than nine of his research team's studies. Their publication cast a favoured light on the university; their retraction represents an emphatic embarrassment.  In his own defence he claimed to have spread himself "too thin" in Calgary, the result being that he then "failed to supervise" his laboratory activities in a proper manner. "I was unable to determine that data provided to me was not performed in proper fashion", he said.

Late in 2012, a journal reviewing one of Dr. Toth's studies (when reputably respectable scientific journals receive a paper for publication, it is peer-reviewed, which is to say someone familiar with the field of science involved, reads the paper to clear it for publication based on its content, verifying methodology and conclusion) "found suspicious data and asked the university to undertake a formal incestigation", explained Dr. MacQueen of the university medical school's administration.

"Subsequently, [subsequent to the watchdog group's original alert] Retraction Watch identified other questionable data" leading to a complaint that triggered a University of Calgary "Committee of Investigation" process. The university, according to Dr. MacQueen, was not prepared to release the report compiled by its investigators, however, "as it contains private, personal information", relating to Dr. Toth who left the university in March of 2013.

Dr. Toth, apart from receiving over $2.3-million in funding for research from diabetes and pain group and drug companies as well as from Alberta research agencies for research purposes, also received funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, funded by taxpayers. He received a five-year grant valued at $600,752 to assess the outcomes of experimental treatments whose purpose was the reduction of brain shrinkage and dementia aligned with diabetes and Alzheimer's disease.

No worry about Dr. Toth's professional future, however. He left the province of Alberta for greener pastures in British Columbia where he now works as a neurologist at Burnaby Hospital. Their neurology group website offers the information that Dr. Toth has had experience as a senior editor for several medical journals, wrote extensively on chronic pain, and was the recipient of a number of teaching awards.

While that description -- omitting information on the retracted studies that had attracted international attention -- makes it appear that this is a man of impeccable background and well-earned professional status, it overlooks the tarnishing of his reputation through the international scrutiny his rejected papers earned because of malfeasance.

What's more his experience as a senior editor, his capability as a teacher, his expertise on chronic pain, make it all the more unwholesomely troublesome that he failed so spectacularly to demonstrate that his reputation was well earned. He has in contrast, by his negligence and pathetic excuse, demonstrated that the loss of his reputation was well earned.

Journals Molecular Pain and Brain retracted two of Toth’s team studies for data manipulation and two more studies in Diabetes were retracted for image doctoring, “fabricated” figures, and using “older data not representative of the cohorts [of mice] studied.” This summer RETRACTED, in bold red type, was slapped on two papers in the journal Neurobiology of Disease, for data manipulation. The two most recent retractions, in the journal Neuroscience, are for “manipulated” figures and “faulty data” — bringing the total to nine.