Ethical Issues with Vaccines & Monoclonal Antibodies
Ethical issues associated with the use of vaccines
- Use of animals:
- All vaccines are tested on animals before they can move onto human-trials (testing on humans) but some people think animal testing is unethical
- Animal-based substances are sometimes used in the production of vaccines but some people disagree with this
- Human testing:
- Even at the human-trial stage, a vaccine carries a small risk (the person being tested on may actually suffer from symptoms of the disease or other, unpredicted side-effects)
- Volunteers may be at higher risk of contracting the disease if they think the trial vaccine will fully protect them but it actually doesn’t (e.g. they might have unprotected sex because they have had a trial HIV vaccine but they actually end up contracting the disease as a result)
- Human volunteers are often paid to take part in vaccine trials. Ethical issues can arise if these volunteers feel pressured into doing this (and potentially being harmed in the process due to the reasons described above) because of their financial status (i.e. people who are struggling financially may be more likely to volunteer themselves)
- Side-effects:
- Some people refuse to take a particular vaccine due to the (usually very small) possibility of side effects
- In fact, these people are often protected due to herd immunity. Other people (who have had the vaccination) may think this is unfair
- Some parents refuse to let their children be vaccinated (for various reasons) but this is ethically questionable - should a parent be allowed to put their child at risk (arguably a much greater risk) of contracting the disease instead?
- Epidemics:
- When new pandemics occur (e.g. Covid-19) there is often a struggle as to who should be vaccinated first (e.g. should the elderly be given priority?)
- There is also often a struggle between countries as to who receives the vaccines first and in what quantities (e.g. poorer countries may not be able to afford as many doses of the vaccine as richer countries - should all countries suffering from a pandemic have equal access to a vaccine?)
Ethical issues associated with the use of monoclonal antibodies
- Ethical issues around monoclonal antibody therapies often revolve around animal rights issues:
- New monoclonal antibody therapies are often tested on animals before they can move onto human-trials but some people think animal testing is unethical
- Currently, animals are used to produce the cells from which the monoclonal antibodies are produced but some people think this is an unethical use of animals