PostDoc-Project

E-Mail: jochen.fehling[at]hfwu.de

Tel.: +49 7022 201 408

 

Post-Doc Project

Marketing of genetic testing between profit optimising and patients‘utility – the role of business ethics

The majority of biomedical technologies are developed, manufactured and sold by companies which are profit-oriented. This is not per se morally reprehensible, but the economic interests of the company can come into conflict with the interests of customers, i.e. the patient, and the caring society. Particularly striking is the problem in the field of drug manufacture if expensive drugs with a marginal utility gain are marketed as a worthwhile therapeutic innovation or if the manufacturer exerts influence to the publication of the study, so that the therapeutic benefits are overestimated, and the burdens and health risks are underestimated (see Strech, 2009). One possible solution consists in a tighter regulation of biotech companies, but this is often politically difficult to enforce and may restrict the latitude of the company too much. An alternative approach is based on the intrinsic knowledge of the industry on their products and production methods and thus their given structural advantage of knowledge over the legislature.

This research project will therefore examine the potential that an industry-wide commitment - in the sense of business ethics - offers to mitigate the conflicts between profit and responsible care for the population. The work is based on the hypothesis that there may be a legitimate form of profit from genetic testing, which is, however, subjected to conditions of an ethical nature. These will be worked out in this project.

The main result will be an ethical checklist that allows biotechnology companies to consider explicitly ethical aspects in the production and marketing of their products and thus to take over social and ethical responsibility (which is often known as corporate social responsibility - CSR). The industry could then enter into a commitment to observe this checklist in marketing.

Due to the increasing importance of so-called individualized medicine (Hüsing et al., 2008) the suggestions will be concretised by the example of genetic testing. In addition to the basic conflict - profit versus benefit for patients - genetic testing offers specific ethical issues (e.g. dealing appropriately with prognostic information, protection of genetic information from the unauthorized access of third parties) that are to be considered in an ethical commitment by biotechnology companies.

Literature:

Hüsing, Bärbel ; Hartig, Juliane ; Bührlen, Bernhard ; Reiß, Thomas ; Gaisser, Sibylle (2008): Individualisierte Medizin und Gesundheitssystem. Zukunftsreport. Arbeitsbericht Nr. 126. Büro für Technikfolgenabschätzung beim Deutschen Bundestag.

Strech, Daniel (2009): Zur Ethik einer restriktiven Regulierung der Studienregistrierung. Ethik in der Medizin: online first.

CV

Education

 

Professional experience

Research Interests

Business ethics, bioethics, ethics as a key competence

 

 

Selected Publications

Books

Die Ethik des „Value of a Statistical Life“. Die Rolle individueller Risikokompetenz für die Legitimität des VSL, Schriftenreihe für Wirtschafts- und Unternehmensethik (sfwu), Band 21, Mering u. München 2009, zgl. Diss. Univ. Tübingen. [The ethics of the “Value of a Statistical Life”. The importance of individual risk competence for the legitimateness of the VSL]

Ethik als Schlüsselkompetenz in Bachelor-Studiengängen. Konzeptionen, Materialien, Literatur; hg. v. Jochen Fehling unter Mitarbeit von Simon Meisch. IZEW, Tübingen 2009. (= IZEW, Materialien zur Ethik in den Wissenschaften. Bd. 6, Druckfassung). [Ethics as a key competence for bachelor degree programmes]

 

Scientific Journals

Selbstbestimmtheitsorientierte Risikoethik. Eine ethische Einordnung des „Value of a Statistical Life“, Vorstellung eines Dissertationsprojekts, in: zfwu Zeitschrift für Wirtschafts- und Unternehmensethik 7 (2) 2006, 263-272. [The autonomy approach to the valuation of risks to human life. Presentation of a PhD project]

 

Collective Volumes

A Monetary Assessment of Death Risks in the Health System? Proposal for an embedding of the concept of the “Value of a Statistical Life” into a participative process of political decision making, in: The Future of Life and Death, ed. by Susumu Shimazono, Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology, University of Tokyo, 2006, 78-94.

European Business and Economic Ethics: Is there a European business and economic ethics approach? Proceedings of a conference held in Heidelberg, Sept. 2007, Journal for Business, Economics & Ethics Special Volume [zfwu], ed. by Dorothea Baur, Franziska Birke, Jochen Fehling, Bettina Hollstein and Mi-Yong Lee-Peuker, 9 (1) 2008.

 

Contact

 

Dr. Jochen Fehling
Hochschule für Wirtschaft und Umwelt Nürtingen-Geislingen
Fakultät Agrarwirtschaft, Volkswirtschaft und Management
Neckarsteige 6-10
72622 Nürtingen

Phone: +49 7022 201 408

E-Mail: jochen.fehling[at]hfwu.de