AMA Journal of Ethics

During the COVID-19 pandemic, masking and hand hygiene are key to individual and public health. Yet many people do not have access to clean water. This painting reiterates the importance of water for health and reminds us to be grateful stewards of this precious natural resource.

This watercolor painting looks to our 20th-century ancestors who fought to establish their, and many of our, voting rights.

When responding to an ad for a job caring for patient-detainees along the US southern border, applicants should anticipate the need to navigate dual loyalties.

Force feeding, unnecessary x-rays, misusing health information, and discharging unstable patients are classic dual-loyalty dilemmas reminiscent of the Holocaust.

Sterilization requires physicians’ surgical skills. Forced sterilization requires many clinicians’ complicity.

Perils of physicians intentionally harming individuals in errant attempts to strengthen a community have been illuminated by the Holocaust.

The Nuremberg Code, the World Medical Association’s declarations of Geneva and Helsinki, and the Belmont Report share an origin in the Holocaust.

Lobbying, maintaining diagnostic skill, participating in national societies, and contributing to robust discourse can influence practice and policy.

Six recommendations focus on specific actions to help reverse the nation’s opioid epidemic.

Mandating processes that are not evidence based generates distress among patients and clinicians, so physician advocacy in national, state, and local policymaking is key.