UNESCO's assistant director general in charge of Social and Human Sciences, Dr. Pierre Sane observed that due to lack of ethical standards in scientific researches, such pharmaceutical companies did not bother to obtain informed consent from volunteers participating in their trials.
 
Sane spoke Friday at Kenya's Egerton public University, near Nakuru town, 170 km west of Nairobi where he inaugurated a bio-ethics center. He lamented that thousands of people in Africa were being enticed by money and other goodies to participate in scientific trials without fully understanding their possible risks.
 
The Bio-ethics center, said to be the first in the third world, aims to ensure that an ethical framework is maintained to protect society from advances in Science and Technology, the UNESCO official disclosed.
 
The center is also mandated to promote research in bio-ethics, create a platform for collaboration, networking and information sharing. "Science without ethics is dangerous as witnessed in such trials where volunteers are not fully informed," Dr. Sane emphasised.
 
UNESCO, he said, was committed to ensuring the monitoring and analysis of the impact of scientific and technological innovations on human rights through the strengthening of its actions on the ethics of science and technology.
 
The UNESCO official, who is in Kenya to attend the 14th Session of the International Bio-ethics Committee meeting in Nairobi, also revealed that the meeting would work on a draft policy on environmental ethics and the growing challenge of toxic waste in Africa.
 
Kenya, Dr. Sane said, had sought the establishment of a resource center in Africa to facilitate exchanges between scholars, policy makers, civil society and other stakeholders on ethical, legal and social concerns stemming from advances in science.
 
To that effect, he added, Egerton University in collaboration with University of Haifa in Israel and the Israel National Commission for UNESCO would conduct an ethics teacher training course 9-13 July, with participants from Kenya.
 
Meanwhile, Vice-chancellor James Tuitoek of Egerton University hoped that more Kenyan students will enrol at the UNESCO-sponsored regional Bio-ethics center since Kenya has a dearth of personnel in this discipline.
 
Tuitoek said the government was working with UNESCO to review policies, equip technical training institutions and other areas with a focus on how to alleviate poverty and improve the quality of life for the people.
 
He observed that Africa was faced with bio-ethical challenges in research and technology, particularly in medical research, human cloning, stem cell research, genetic testing, genetically modified organisms and human organ donation.
 
Tuitoek emphasised the necessity of Bio-ethics for the continent to understand the impacts of such scientific activities on human beings, bio-diversity and environment. 19 May 2007 - PANA
 

Click here for the Africa Health platform