The European Convention on Bioethics

For nearly 20 years, the Council of Europe, the organization for intergovernmental cooperation of the great Europe (26 countries are members of the council) has worked in the different fields of what is now called bioethics (reproductive technologies, organ transplants, human experimentation, etc). The council mainly proposes recommendations to member states in order to implement harmonized legislation. During the past ten years, this activity has been concentrated in a unique and multidisciplinary committee of experts; the CAHBI (ad hoc Committee of Experts on Bioethics). The recent development of national and very diverse legislation related to bioethical issues emphasized the necessity of adopting common binding principles at the European level. It was then decided at the end of 1991 by the Committee of Ministers of the council that the CAHBI would prepare a European Convention on Bioethics. This text, which is now being drafted, will in fact be composed of three documents. The Convention itself will list a set of general principles such as respect for human dignity, respect for the integrity of the person, the prohibition of any commercial arrangement on the human body and the principle of nondiscrimination. Two protocols will specifically deal with two important bioethical issues: organ transplants and human experimentation, but other topics could be covered in the future. All these texts will create obligations for member states and others that would like to ratify them to implement national regulations. An independent committee will have the duty to control how these obligations will be respected.