GARRISON, N.Y., March 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Bioethics Forum, a free online publication featuring brief commentary on topics in bioethics, has been launched by the Hastings Center Report, a leading bioethics journal. The topics include patient care, health policy, medical science and research, biotechnology, the beginnings and endings of life, and environment and health.

The Forum is billed as an experiment. "We're aiming the Forum at a spot somewhere between the typical blog and an online magazine," says Gregory Kaebnick, editor of the Report and the moderator of the Forum. "We want to provide the timeliness and liveliness of blogs while drawing upon and developing thoughtful, measured work of the sort that blogs are not always known for. Also, blogs often feature a particular perspective, often even some one particular person's voice, but we intend to feature a range of sometimes clashing perspectives."

Most of the Forum's essays are from a slate of 14 regular contributors. The contributors represent a range of perspectives and disciplines, although all of them do scholarly work in bioethics. Most of them work within the United States; several are from abroad. Guest commentators will also appear on the site from time to time, and readers' responses to the commentaries may also be posted. Other fare includes links to opinion pieces available elsewhere on the Internet, as well as to an assortment of useful bioethics blogs.

Both the Forum and the Report are published by The Hastings Center, a nonpartisan bioethics research institute founded in 1969. The Report is read by physicians and other health care personnel, scholars, lawyers, hospital administrators, and others interested in the ethical and policy issues of health care.

CONTACT: Gregory E. Kaebnick, +1-845-424-4040 x227,
kaebnickg@thehastingscenter.org

Web site: http://www.thehastingscenter.org/