By Michael Cook Over the centuries the Hippocratic Oath has expressed the ideals of the medical profession, although nowadays other versions have supplanted it for graduating medical students– if they take any oath at all. If taken literally the Oath is an anachronism. Who today “swears by Apollo Physician, by Asclepius, by Hygieia, by Panacea, …
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By Wesley J. Smith The Hippocratic Oath is dead. “Do no harm” medicine is fast becoming extinct. Contemporary health care is increasingly under the sway of a utilitarian bioethics that makes the elimination of suffering the prime directive—to the detriment of traditional standards of medical morality that deem all human life equally worthy of care …
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By Wesley J. Smith Editor’s note. This is excerpted from an essay that appeared at First Things. I will use treatment to help the sick according to my ability and judgment, but never with a view to injury and wrong-doing. Neither will I administer a poison to anybody when asked to do so, nor will …
Continue reading "The War on the Hippocratic Oath"Is the value of human life slowly being eroded? By Michael Cook A modern successor to the Hippocratic Oath has been approved by the World Medical Association. This is the first revision in a decade and reflects changes in the climate of medical ethics. The current declaration is still a noble attempt to affirm that …
Continue reading "World Medical Association updates Hippocratic Oath"By Wesley J. Smith Editor’s note. This appears on Wesley’s excellent blog at http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/2011/04/09/contemporary-medical-oaths-exert-little-professional-pull-on-new-doctors/ Several years ago, I wrote about the woeful decline in the taking of the Hippocratic Oath, and the pabulum replacements that really did not require new doctors to pledge anything very meaningful at all. From my 2006 piece, “Harm Done,” in …
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