Med Law Rev. 2014 Spring;22(2):221-37. doi: 10.1093/medlaw/fwu004.

The UK National Health Service's 'Innovation Agenda': Lessons on Commercialisation and Trust.

Sterckx S1, Cockbain J2.

Author information

• 1Bioethics Institute Ghent, Department of Philosophy and Moral Sciences, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium sigrid.sterckx@ugent.be.
• 2Consultant European Patent Attorney, Ghent, Belgium.

Abstract

The UK National Health Service (the 'NHS'), encouraged by the 2011 report Innovation Health and Wealth, Accelerating Adoption and Diffusion in the NHS, and empowered by the Health and Social Care Act 2012, is in the process of adopting a new agenda for stimulating innovation in healthcare. For this, the bodies, body materials, and confidential health information of NHS patients may be co-opted. We explain why this brings the NHS into a moral conflict with its basic goal of providing a universal healthcare service. Putting NHS databases at the disposal of industry, without addressing ethical concerns regarding the privacy, autonomy, and moral integrity of patients and without requiring a 'kick-back' to enhance the service that the NHS provides, is inappropriate. As this article shows, with reference to the commercial arena of direct-to-consumer genetic testing, it is crucial that patient and public trust in the NHS is not eroded.