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Peer-reviewed article

Commentary: Physicians as Public Servants in the Setting of Bioterrorism

Physicians have special professional obligations to respond to medical emergencies. A bioterrorism attack would be a medical emergency. Thus, it seems that physicians would have an obligation to respond to a bioterrorist attack. However,…

By John D. LantosJanuary 1, 20061 min readin Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics

Physicians have special professional obligations to respond to medical emergencies. A bioterrorism attack would be a medical emergency. Thus, it seems that physicians would have an obligation to respond to a bioterrorist attack. However, the scope of those obligations, and their limits, are vexed topics. General rules may be comforting but the details and nuances of particular situations will always be relevant.This work was supported by the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics. The funding source had no role in the analysis or in the decision to submit the manuscript for publication.

Originally published at Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics · January 1, 2006.

About the author

John D. Lantos is a pediatrician and bioethicist writing on AI in medicine, neonatal intensive care, and end-of-life decisions. His essays appear in JAMA, JAMA Pediatrics, the Hastings Center Report, the New England Journal of Medicine, and Aeon. Read more about John.

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