"Veatch and Guidry-Grimes have set a new standard for balancing breadth, clarity, and accessibility for introductory texts in healthcare ethics. They impressively cover a wide range of important topics, and they are judicious and fair in their discussion of the many sides to pressing bioethical debates. This text will serve well undergraduate students in general healthcare ethics courses, as well as anyone looking for an up-to-date guide to contemporary debates in bioethics."
Michael J. Deem, Duquesne University
"A good bioethics primer will give a concise skim of basic concepts and still manage to show where there is consensus and disagreement and why. It will introduce new frameworks and provide a range of
cases from classic to piping hot fresh. It may well have a point of view, but it will not pretend to be the only possible point of view. This is that primer.
Embedded in the American medical context,
The Basics of Bioethics, Fourth Edition incorporates new approaches to bioethics into the classic bioethics toolkit, includes discussions of end-of-life issues and consent but also of reproduction and genetics, and addresses social aspects of health care including the ever-shifting U.S. policy context. Classic cases like Canterbury and Henrietta Lacks partner with modern ones on weight-loss surgery, CRISPR genetic technology, and the contested end of teenager Jahi McMath's life. Each chapter can stand alone and could enrich another primary text-if whatever else you're reading leaves out virtue ethics, narrative ethics, care ethics, and feminist ethics, there's a chapter here for that. However, this book is also an effective single text. If you're looking for an American bioethics primer that doesn't just retread old ground, but includes fertile new frameworks and topics, this one's worth your time."
Alison Reiheld, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
