title: Ethics and the European countries in transition--the past and the future.
abstract: This paper surveys the situation regarding bioethical issues in the European transitional societies. It aims at exploring past, present and future characteristics of bioethics in the European countries in transitions, analysing similarities, differences and common themes together with the historical development of bioethics. By carefully studying articles published since the early 1990s, one can perceive a number of bioethical issues, varying from specificities for certain countries to similar problems for all transitional European societies. It seems that more than 15 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Central and Eastern European societies were able to achieve significant improvements in the development of bioethics. However, looking at the bioethical issues important for European transitional societies, it seems that the invisible wall between eastern and western European societies is still there and that it will take years to remove it.
authors.affiliation: Andrija Stampar School of Public Health, Medical School, University of Zagreb, Rockefellerova 4, 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia. abor@mef.hr
authors.forename: Ana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Borovecki
authors.forename: Henk
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: ten Have
authors.forename: Stiepan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Oreskovic
mesh_terms: D026688:Bioethical Issues; D001675:Bioethics / Q000193:education / Q000639:trends*; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D017041:Ethics Committees / Q000458:organization & administration; D005061:Europe, Eastern; D038622:Internationality; D011056:Political Systems; D012922:Social Change