The Right to Informed Consent at the Convergence of International Biolaw and International Human Rights Law

Informed consent is a fundamental tenet of medical ethics conjugating ethical imperatives and respect for human rights in biomedical research as well as in the exercise of the medical profession. It is considered the foundation of the “new ethos of patient autonomy”, since recognition of autonomy in health care decision-making has enabled and empowered competent patients to retain control of their lives and has come to govern the doctor-patient relationship consistently with respect for the right to self-determination. From the legal viewpoint, informed consent represents a well-established rule of both biolaw and of human rights law. In fact, the bioethical and human rights-based approaches to the life sciences share common foundations and values, converging over the common objective of protecting human dignity and the integrity of every human being from the risks posed by the progress of technology and its applications to the natural processes governing the beginning and the end of life. Hence, in the relative paucity of universally agreed principles providing a framework for ethical conduct in the biomedical field, informed consent – just like the basic principle of respect for human dignity – stands as the cornerstone of biomedical law and human rights law alike.