What are the Medical Ethics Hot Button Issues for 2025?

Without taking a position on any of these, we have identified the following areas of medical practice as hot button issues.

Healthcare for Transgender Youth: The criminalization of gender-affirming healthcare on one hand vs the claims that rendering such care is unscientific and abusive. We believe this will be the number one hot button issue going forward.

Reproductive Rights and Health: The overturning of Roe v. Wade has led to significant litigation but as states enact laws the constitutionality of such laws will be questioned.

Marijuana Use: As marijuana legalization increases, ethical questions about its use, research, and medical applications remain unresolved. There is little hard science on the long term effects of marijuana and doctors who prescribe, recommend or suggest its use may find that standard of care and civil liability issues will be raised by patients claiming harm.

Organ Donation: The debate over ethical allocation of organs, animal organs, organs from persons with various conditions will be debated medically with a lack of strong scientific research.

Social Media Use: The professional use of social media by physicians with a focus on treatments that are no very well researched will be the subject of malpractice actions as well as false advertising and other non-protected (e.g. by California’s MICRA law) causes of action.

Reporting Unethical Behavior: The obligation to report incompetent or unethical conduct by colleagues, has been established for lawyers in California. Increasingly doctors may be required to actually report substandard care or be implicated in ethical violations.