I'm a health-care provider(Medical Doctor) and i'm carrying a load on my chest and i'll love honest answers or suggessions from u as regards this topic.
I'm a specialist in the field of Obstetrics and Gynaecology and quite frequently i often meet this re-occuring sad situation,
A pretty young lady about 24yrs of age came to my Gynae Clinic with compliants of in-ability to become pregnant for the past 2yrs & 6months of their marrage! so we got talking and she admited to having done 13abortions before marrying her husband, however b4 marrying her husband she told him that she was a virgin but got rapped @ 17yrs of age during which time she became pregnant and had to abort the pregnancy following intervention of her parents and since then she has being a very good Girl. Now further clinical investigation in that direction showed that both her fallopian tubes were blocked and more advanced procedures would be required, and i wish that, that was the end of the story. but,
This lady is also HIV positive and when she found out, she hid her status from the young man who is the only son of his parents and recently got promoted @ his place of work! sadly this lady isn't wrking and didn't want to miss-out on the chance of marrying this well-to-do young man in his late twenties, both of them tested their status b4 the marrage i.e 7 & 2mths respectively, however what the lady did was to arrange with lab scientist so that she will test negative on both occassions and the lab. technician agreeded to this arrangement.
the lady following the marrage is now on treatment and unknown to the young man he is infected but doesn't know, adding to the already difficult and expensive problem of her tubes being blocked.

The 2nd example i want to give is a more unfortunate one involving a young Alhaji who is a very senior director @ his place of wrk in Abuja and his wife. they had being married for 8yrs with no children and following pressure by the wife he agreed to see a gynaecologist, following Full evaluation of the both of them the problem was from the man, he had no sperm in his ejaculate. so the wife came from behind and met the doctor seeking to know the result, & as soon as she was told that she wasn't the problem! she arranged with the doctor to give the husband a different result showing that he was Ok and was capable of getting his wife pregnant. so on their Appointment day he was told the comforting news that they were all fine and that they can go-ahead and make babies, so this woman now started having sex with the man's best friend and delivered two children for this man, and both these children were males so Alhaji was very very happy and started showering his wife with all manner of gifts put the children in one of the best secondary schools in Abuja and anything she wanted he provided it for her,  and i wish that the story ended here.

But One faithfull day while the madam was at home with the husband trouble came knocking,  A woman came to the house from outside with a pregnancy claming that the pregnancy belonged to Alhaji and seriously insisting, to make matters worse Alhaji innocently accepted the pregnancy as his own since he has two male children already at home a third wouldn't be a bad idea. and Alhaji started making preparations to marry this woman as his 2nd wife, contacted the family of the lady. etc. etc,

Meanwhile the Woman at home knows the whole truth and that the other woman from outside is lying but what must she do now to stop the man from marrying this woman and secure her position in the House of Alhaji,   She did the unimaginable, and mind you it wasn't murder, it was something more than that,

Can you guess what she likely did,

zipper003:


Can you guess what she likely did,

You are the one telling the story, finish it PLEASE.,

mama-gee:

I think being ethical and moral are both appropriate cause they go together.

But, if someone had to choose between the both of them, I 'll recommend choosing being moral because when someone is moral he/she will have the mentality of choosing right over wrong.

But the poster is a health practitioner, where ethics must be strictly adhered to.

It's not your business what is morally right or wrong, do your work and turn a blind eye

And based on the oath you took that ,

I will respect the secrets which are confided in me;

mama-gee:

^^Being ethical and morally educated are both important and bring good and remarkable results.

As a health practitionar, he should have both. . .but if I had to choose, I'll choose morality because when you're moral, you can stay away from doing all sorts of bad things.

Yeah for sure,

In the 1st case, their relationship had reached an advanced stage and you dont just expect him to turn around and say ok since you have done something

this bad and it goes against my moral thinking [/b]to treat such issues, you have to leave now,

or he accepts to work with her but divulges the secret to the husband , this things are tricky and it is better to stick to professionally laid down rules than

moral thinking.

What might be morally[b] 'right' for me might be morally [b]'wrong' [/b]for you.

@Poster your 1st example TRULY   interests me.

Your a Doctor so you will be able to give me the answers to my questions.

You have a ethical duty to your patient to keep her medical history private but, is she not obliged to give you the name or names of her sexual contacts? and are you not obliged to inform him/them of her HIV status? and finally are you not duty bond to advice the husband to go for another test?

So in the case of the 1st example ETHICS wins the day in my eye .

Ethics too

@poster
please, tell the rest of the story oooooooooooooooooo. Am on my kneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees begging you pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease.

Whao!

the first story:

The lady in question is a very wicked, crafty, evil, and to me she has committed murder, committing 13 abortions!!!! and hiding her HIV status from the young man. Men please wake up. Why would a lady who has messed up her life now want to settle down with a young man?
Doc, i think you have to be moral here.

Second Story.
I have watched a nollywood film with exact same scripts. I guess what she did is to provide the original results of the Alhaji's test

@ OP, how can you tell a story and then tell us to end it for you, finish your story please!

unclebros:

Whao!

the first story:

The lady in question is a very wicked, crafty, evil, and to me she has committed murder, committing 13 abortions!!!! and hiding her HIV status from the young man. Men please wake up. Why would a lady who has messed up her life now want to settle down with a young man?
Doc, i think you have to be moral here.

Tell the secrets, and the young man commits suicide!

So doci now has to carry that conscience of indirectly killing someone ?

@Mdsocks

the guy is already dead!
Living with someone like the lady in question is death!

If we understand ethics aright, you will observe that all ethical rules were derived from moral thinking.  A man who is morally upright must at the same time be ethical in his conduct.  The two cannot really be separated.  However, where a conflict does exist between ethics and morality, then you must examine the situation critically and you will discover that ethical rules were not followed in the first place and that is what is now giving rise to moral and ethical contradiction.

Take the two stories and examine them:

First Story:

zipper003:


This lady is also HIV positive and when she found out, she hid her status from the young man who is the only son of his parents and recently got promoted @ his place of work! sadly this lady isn't wrking and didn't want to miss-out on the chance of marrying this well-to-do young man in his late twenties, both of them tested their status b4 the marrage i.e 7 & 2mths respectively, however what the lady did was to arrange with lab scientist so that she will test negative on both occassions and the lab. technician agreeded to this arrangement.

If the Lab Scientist had followed ethical rules, he would not have played along with the lady, thereby he committed the crime of falsification and lying.  This entire fiasco would have been avoided if the Lab Scientist had been ethical!

Then the second story:

zipper003:


The 2nd example i want to give is a more unfortunate one involving a young Alhaji who is a very senior director @ his place of wrk in Abuja and his wife. they had being married for 8yrs with no children and following pressure by the wife he agreed to see a gynaecologist, following Full evaluation of the both of them the problem was from the man, he had no spermatozoa in his expel. so the wife came from behind and met the doctor seeking to know the result, & as soon as she was told that she wasn't the problem! she arranged with the doctor to give the husband a different result showing that he was Ok and was capable of getting his wife pregnant. so on their Appointment day he was told the comforting news that they were all fine and that they can go-ahead and make babies.

The doctor in the second story also broke ethical rules by also playing along with the woman by not only withholding the real result, but also falsifying the result on the basis of which the woman started her pranks.  As serious as the matter is, there is a comical aspect to it which clearly should be a warning to all who wish to travel on the same road as these unethical professionals and the heartless ladies in question:

These days, the evil that men do no longer live after them, but with them!

If this is really a true story then I think you should be a professional about it but insist both women tell their husbands the truth.

Lady 1 deserves to die and burn in hell. Yes there are better treatments for HIV now but why infect an innocent man? why? I wonder how she manages to sleep at night.

Lady 2 I have no words for so did she just cheat on her husband 2 times to have the kids or is it an ongoing activity? Well she got what was coming to her because she will have to seat on the truth and watch another woman have a baby for her husband.

This is very interesting but what did the second lady do?

Can't wait to get the rest of the story.

Ebonyeyes:

If this is really a true story then I think you should be a professional about it but insist both women tell their husbands the truth.

Lady 1 deserves to die and burn in hell. Yes there are better treatments for HIV now but why infect an innocent man? why? I wonder how she manages to sleep at night.

Lady 2 I have no words for so did she just cheat on her husband 2 times to have the kids or is it an ongoing activity? Well she got what was coming to her because she will have to seat on the truth and watch another woman have a baby for her husband.

can't stop asking myself, uhm

ethical vs moral.I think in the book of ethics you should equally try to save the life of the young man who is not aware he has HIV

Why do people like to put their mouth in things that don't concern them. You are a doctor, do your ethically bound duty. After that, MIND YA BUSINESS!

Some people just hv 'messiah' complex.

i find it difficult to believe the stories . . . . Mr. Doc.

@Zipper003,

    you're between a rock and a hard place, this is terrible. JohnKester said some very good things and I hear what everyone is saying about ethics and it's not your business and they're all right . . . but . . . if it were me I would speak up, because if the situation was reversed and I were that unsuspecting young man who's life is about to be ruined, and probably contract that death sentence called HIV, I would hope someone who had the power to prevent such a devastating thing from happening to me, would've taken action - even though it would come at a cost to them - personally or professionally.

Sometimes, it runs far deeper than "it's not my business/place". Do onto others as you'd have them unto you.

Well for the first one. What is stopping you from advising the man to get a second opinion?

You dont have to "get in their business" you dont have to get into deep and risk your licence. But, you can get the man tested again.
I mean this is the case of life or death here.

I'd rather be moral.
if in any situation being ethical is not a subset of being moral, then in
that situation being ethical = being unreasonable.

Choosing between being ethical or moral totally depends on the given situation and the relationship between the self doing the choosing and the situation.

In this situation, I'D rather be ethical.

She confided in you because of the Doctor-Patient relationship you both have.
Nothing brings you together except work and it's your duty to obey the rules that govern that work.
One of which is - Your patient's privacy must be of great importance.
In a country where abortion is legal, if I asked a doctor to carry one out on me, it wouldn't be his duty to advise me to keep the pregnancy nor preach its negative effects to me nor tell anyone about it.
I pay, You do it and we go our separate ways. I could sue him, if he does otherwise.


However, if you were her confidant, you could consider being moral because in this situation, your relationship with her is not subject to any ethical rule.
Only you, decide what you would do with the information she's given you.
If I told my friend's mum that her daughter [my friend] confided in me about her intention to carry out an abortion next week, it wouldn't be unethical and it wouldn't be immoral too, if i don't see anything wrong in my action. of course, to some other person, it might be immoral as they can argue that I'm supposed to keep a secret, secret. The reason I say morality is subjective.



Whenever you have to choose between being ethical or moral, if you choose to be moral, and that moral act doesn't fall within the parameters of the ethical rule(s), there's always a Not-So-Nice consequence.
You can still choose to be moral, if you're willing to face the music.

JohnKester:

If we understand ethics aright, you will observe that all ethical rules were derived from moral thinking.

I concur!

JohnKester:

A man who is morally upright must at the same time be ethical in his conduct. 

Following your first statement, shouldn't this line be reprased to- A man who's ethical in his conduct must be morally upright ?
Even if that correction is made, I still beg to disagree.

I opine that, while morality is totally subjective [an individual determines what's
moral and immoral], ethics are rules that dictate the working of a social system. Of course, regarding what's right and wrong.
It's not the duty of one individual to determine what's ethical or not/ lay down ethical rules.  . . . .It's is therefore not subjective.
This is why one might argue that going over the speed limit is unethical but less
likely would one say it's immoral because to the driver, it might just be moral.


Having said that, I'll now go back to your comment again.

JohnKester:

A man who is morally upright must at the same time be ethical in his conduct. 

I beg to disagree.
I can be morally upright and not be ethical in my conduct and vice-versa.
Example: While it may be unethical to harbor a malefactor, I may not not see anything wrong in it, as every individual deserves to be helped.
If I went ahead and harbored that malefactor, I would have acted in accordance to my moral belief ; which makes me  moral but not ethical, under that given situation.

JohnKester:

However, where a conflict does exist between ethics and morality, then you must examine the situation critically and you will discover that ethical rules were not followed in the first place and that is what is now giving rise to moral and ethical contradiction.

Not always the case, I'D say.
Had that lab scientist not agreed to the woman's request [hence, been ethical], she probably would have :
1-Found another way to keep her husband in the dark about her HIV status,
2- Gotten married to him anyways, and
3- Still gone to the OP to voice her problems.

Consequentially, the Op would have, in any case, still been in this position of choosing between being moral or ethical.

@ poster

You aren't ethical youself by posting confidential info on a public forum.