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Health Law and Emerging Technologies (LAWS70421)
Graduate coursework level 7Points: 12.5On Campus (Parkville)
About this subject
- Overview
- Eligibility and requirements
- Assessment
- Dates and times
- Further information
- Timetable(opens in new window)
Contact information
March
Lecturer
Professor Emeritus Loane Skene, Coordinator
Email: law-masters@unimelb.edu.au
Phone: +61 3 8344 6190
Website: law.unimelb.edu.au
Overview
Availability(Quotas apply) | March |
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Fees | Look up fees |
Health and medical law is constantly changing, with new technology, new treatments and new ethical issues. These developments may raise pressing concerns for health service providers, government agencies, other regulatory bodies, academics in many fields and more broadly for society. This subject will focus on a range of emerging issues. Discussion will be highly specialised with detailed analytical examination and critical reflection on relevant issues, taking account of established theories on different bodies of knowledge or practice. It will focus on Australian federal and Victorian law but include discussion of developments in other countries.
The subject will be taught by Professor Skene, who has more than 30 years’ experience in legal practice, law reform, policy advice and ethical analysis. She has served on numerous federal and state advisory committees, including the federal Lockhart and Heerey Committees on human embryo and stem cell research.
This subject provides a critical examination of a range of new developments in medicine and science. Principal topics include legal and ethical issues, and current processes of legislative revision at federal and state level, relating to:
- Mandatory childhood vaccination
- Developments in reproductive technology (IVF, surrogacy etc)
- ‘Personalised medicine’
- ‘Gene editing’ and other emerging scientific techniques
- ‘Medical tourism’ (treatments in other countries that are not permitted in Australia)
- Human stem cell research and its applications
- Use of stored genetic material and cell lines in clinical treatment and research
- Organ transplants
- Other topical issues that arise later and while the subject is being taught.
Intended learning outcomes
A student who has successfully completed this subject will:
- Have an advanced and integrated understanding of the medical or scientific basis of the various emerging technologies considered in the classes.
- Be able to critically evaluate, analyse, interpret and assess relevant ethical and legal issues arising from those technologies.
- Have an advanced understanding of issues of human rights, equality of access to health care and potential discrimination that may arise in emerging technologies, including in an international context
- Have examined a range of legislation and law reports in order to understand underlying principles that may be relevant when new technologies emerge, particularly when there seem to be no applicable legal principles in an emerging area.
- Have the cognitive and technical skills to generate critical and creative ideas, and to critically evaluate existing legal theories, principles and concepts
- Be able to suggest legal and other changes that may be appropriate to regulate emerging technologies.
- Have an advanced understanding of the factors and processes driving parliamentary revision of the legal framework; and other means of achieving regulatory change, such as ethical and professional guidelines.
- Have advanced communication skills to clearly articulate and convey complex information to specialist and non-specialist audiences; and to be an engaged participant in ongoing debates regarding emerging and contemporary issues in the field.
- Be able to critically analyse ethical and legal issues arising from new technologies in a detailed, fully referenced research essay.
Last updated: 3 November 2022