Health care, medical education and caste in India

In the last issue of the journal we carried an editorial supporting the right of doctors to go on strike when it is for a good reason. We believe that the recent agitation by medical students against the reservation policy is not for a good reason. An editorial and a comment in this issue discuss the subject of health care, medical education and caste in India. Another editorial notes that the medical profession has remained a silent witness to the crisis of malnutrition in this country.

In this issue of the journal we carry an article that goes against the views of the editor. Women’s and health activists have long fought against the medical profession’s promotion of sex selection. Indeed, the medical profession’s role in promoting sex selection and unethical population-control policies has been the centre of a good part of the medical ethics debate in India. However, ethical medical professionals hold different points of view on these subjects. The selected summary in this issue, on sex selection and the impact of China’s one-child policy, represents a point of view that is not shared by the editor or by all members of the editorial board. It is hoped that this will provoke further debate on the subject.

Other essays in the journal discuss guidelines for transfusion medicine in the international and Indian contexts; the problems caused by the absence of standard guidelines on the examination and treatment of survivors of sexual assault, and some difficult choices that might be faced by doctors offering assisted reproductive technology. The case study and responses examine ethical challenges encountered while resuscitating in the operating room.