Iranian Journal of Medical Ethics and History of Medicine

---

Spiritual care includes assistance in performing religious rituals to support those seeking connection to the spiritual world. It forms an essential part of holistic care and helps finding answers to issues concerning life, pain, and death. This study was conducted to understand cancer patients' perception of spiritual care.A qualitative content analysis approach was applied to conduct the study. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with convenience sampling of 17 cancer patients and their family members in oncology wards of a hospital in Tehran and Behnam Daheshpor Charity Organization. The recorded interviews were transcribed verbatim. For data reduction, data were labeled and coded before content analysis.The following themes were identified: characteristics and duties of nurses with a spiritual approach in religious and non religious domains, care with a spiritual approach in religious and non religious domains (emotional, communicational, functional), barriers to spiritual care.According to our findings, nurses do not satisfy all spiritual needs of the participants, because the characteristics and practices of nurses do not meet the expectations of patients and their family members, and ward environment does not support such care.

---

In recent years, vaccination programs have advanced significantly due to the progress in molecular biology and biotechnology. Research on plant-made vaccines has become a very tempting subject and transgenic plant technology to produce human or animal vaccines has attracted much attention. Numerous advantages have been reported for vaccine production in transgenic plants such as low cost, ease of maintenance, lack of infection, and high compatibility with the immune system. So far, many of these vaccines are being produced in various plants. The present paper attempts to introduce plant made-vaccines and at the same time discuss the ethical aspects related to the production and clinical testing of these vaccines from three aspects: production of edible vaccines in transgenic plants, clinical tests on plant-made vaccines and plant-made vaccines and global health. Although many aspects of the ethical issues related to plant made vaccines are those that have been reported in transgenic plants, new problems have risen for ethicists and policy makers. Furthermore, the hope of the widespread use of these types of vaccines in developing countries without considering the possibility of plant surveys is unrealistic. Therefore, commercial feasibility for the development of plant-made vaccines in developing countries is very important as a solution to global health problems.

---

Eugenics or the science of breeding humans is a movement based on biological concepts that advocate policies for improvement of the human population genetics. It has also served as a determinant factor and reference in many social disciplines including law and punishment during certain periods in history. In fact, based on eugenic policies, which were affirmed by biologists, health experts and physicians, many people were sentenced to elimination from the society’s gene pool and thereby underwent sexual sterilization. Such practices were approved by economists and jurists involved in the executive affairs of many countries as well. Publication of two separate journals about eugenics and the corresponding empirical data confirming the influence of genetics on behaviors along with the solidity of eugenics-related policies demonstrate the scientific significance of this movement in its heyday. This public legitimacy started to decline, however, after sterilization of tens of thousands of mentally or physically handicapped people by Nazi Germany and the ascending criticism on moral and scientific bases of eugenics, which almost led to the exclusion of the subject in public. In this essay, eugenic concepts, relevant policies and its legitimacy throughout history are discussed to provide a better outlook for adopting more effective strategies in public health policymaking