I have had the privilege to receive a scholarship to enroll in the Bioethics Education International Spring School 2024. This is my first time attending such a school and I am glad I took this opportunity.

What makes the school unique is the extraordinary international speakers, who are experts in their fields. The school is open to people of all backgrounds – from high school students to professionals. This diverse background enriched all the discussions. Special thanks to Dr Ana Lita, who has worked hard to organize this school.
A variety of topics were discussed that intrigued me. A particular interest that grew was artificial intelligence (AI) and bioethics. I had known we had many developments in AI over the years, but during particular lectures, I was astonished at what we had to deal with in the near future. Dr Perihan Elif Ekmekci, a professor from Turkey, discussed artificial intelligence in her lecture titled “Reflections of Generative AI, Bioethics and Health: Threats, Risks, and Opportunities for Humanity”. On the third day of the school, Eve Herold gave an interesting talk titled “Holding on to our Humanity in an Age of Social Robots”. Eve discussed humanoid robots – how similar the interaction between robots and humans has become. Like everything in life, there are positives and negatives. The positives of having humanoid robots are with the elderly and those with disabilities. These populations need to have someone constantly present with them. However, when something goes wrong, who do we blame? Is the robot held accountable? Is it the manufacturer? Is it the designer? Does the robot have a consciousness like we humans do. The negative effects also include feeding our narcissism. The robot reflects us. So, we will be feeding our ego more?

On the last day of the school, Adarsh Srivastava gave an interactive session titled “AI Ethics: Why it matters!”. He used his expertise from working in a renown pharmaceutical company to give insight into the importance of AI ethics. He started the presentation with a live demonstration of an AI version of him, giving an introduction on the matter. This video astonished the audience as it was as if Adarsh was himself speaking, when in fact it was an AI. He then proceeded to give examples where AI poses ethical concerns including the bias it has and its inaccurate information, as seen in fake citations created by ChatGPT, an AI that is gaining popularity.

We concluded the course with a group discussion on two topics: AI ethics and patient-physician interaction and the role of humanity. The participants were divided into two groups based on interest, and both groups discussed the topics and presented thoughtful PowerPoint presentations.
Of course, we need to thank all our speakers for sharing their expertise.

Dr Francis P Crawley gave an interesting lecture titled ‘Frontline Bioethics: War, Disease, Politics and the Impact on Humanity’, Dr Joyce M Tsoka-Gwegweni PhD raised the issue of universal health coverage in Africa, and Dr Jonathan D. Moreno gave an insightful talk in this lecture “Absolutely Essential”: Bioethics and the Rules-Based International Order.
In the lecture titled ‘Preserving Integrity in Science’, Dr Jeanne F. Loring discusses research and integrity in science, including some challenges we face in our professional research journey.
I would like to thank Dr Michael R. Berman for sharing his lovely poems and experiences while dealing with death especially in patients we cannot cure.
We had three insightful sessions on covid, and lessons learned during the covid years. Dr Bryn Williams Jones engaged us in a discussion on bioethics in public spaces, and how this applied to the covid pandemic. He empowered us, bioethics enthusiasts on our role in teaching the public. Dr John Loike proceeded in giving a detailed overview on covid, from the pathophysiology of the disease to the current treatment regimens. Dr Jacob Appel provided insight into the public health view of covid in his session “Risk & Resource Allocation in Times of Crisis: Lessons from the Recent Pandemic”.
We saw an interface between the arts and the sciences. Dr Frederick Licciardi, a Professor in Obstetrics and Gynecology discussed ethical dilemmas in fertility treatments in his session titled “Scientific Foundation for the Ethical Discussion of Fertility Treatments”. He is himself a musician and a scientist – providing we can have a connection between the arts and sciences.

The whole course proved to be in line with Bioethics Education International’s (BEI) mission. BEI is a not-for-profit international organization aiming at advancing policy and intercultural bioethics debates from the beginning to the end of life. Through online engaging and interactive sessions, pertinent topics were discussed and incorporated into an interdisciplinary and intercultural approach. The course included a diversity of international participants and speakers enriching the debates and discussions and provided opportunities for networking.
Finally, a special thank you to Dr Ana Lita for her dedication to the BEI mission and to her interns Saniyya Butler, Pushpa Jadhav and Aiden Wang who have organized the sessions to work so smoothly!

Rola Itani, MD
Family Medicine Resident
American University of Beirut
Lebanon