Medical Business Ethics: The HIV-Tainted-Blood Affair in Japan

Abstract

Through an analysis of the HIV-Tainted-Blood Affair in Japan, this paper explores why pharmaceutical companies act in a socially irresponsible manner. The paper suggests encouraging members of these corporations to become more conscious of their responsibility to society by developing themselves as professionals. The analysis shows that drug disasters are not caused only by a particular “special villain,” but by the structural conflict between medical professional ethics and the profit making motivation of pharmaceutical companies. In other words, the behaviors of pharmaceutical companies fall into the interstices of professional ethics.

Citation

Tanaka, T. (2005), "Medical Business Ethics: The HIV-Tainted-Blood Affair in Japan", Takahashi, T. (Ed.) Taking Life and Death Seriously - Bioethics from Japan (Advances in Bioethics, Vol. 8), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 253-273. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1479-3709(05)08810-2