Women’s Bioethical Challenges in the Jewish State with Vardit Ravitsky

Description

Don’t miss this fascinating evening on Monday, March 17 at 7:30 pm with Vardit Ravitsky, President and CEO of the Hastings Center, an independent, nonpartisan bioethics research institute that is among the most prestigious bioethics and health policy institutes in the world.

How do cultural values shape bioethical dilemmas? This talk will describe the case-study of Israel. As a Jewish-democratic state, several bioethical challenges have been addressed by Israeli policy-makers based on historical, cultural, and religious perspectives. Three examples will be used: fertility care, end of life decision-making, and posthumous reproduction (including the impact of Oct 7th). Prof. Ravitsky was involved in policy making in Israel on these issues, allowing her to provide an ‘insider’s look’ into the interplay of cultural values and democratic discourse.

Vardit, in addition to being President and CEO of the Hastings Center, is a Full Professor at the Bioethics Program, School of Public Health, University of Montreal and Senior Lecturer on Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. She is Past President of the International Association of Bioethics. Ravitsky’s research focuses on the ethics of genomics and reproduction, as well as the use of AI in biomedical research. She has published over 200 articles and commentaries on bioethical issues, and has given over 300 talks world-wide and over 400 media interviews.