ABSTRACT
Since the time of Moore v Regents of the University of California, it has become a well-established and widespread view that a person, when their separated body parts are misappropriated, is forced to limit themselves to fiduciary and other non-proprietary claims against those who violate the bodily inviolability of their separated parts. Now, with the filing of a lawsuit in defense of the rights in body parts of the victim of racial discrimination, Henrietta Lacks, the judicial system has an opportunity to justify itself by adopting a different dogma of the perception of rights in human body parts. This article focuses on the justification for the fundamental similarity between separated human body parts and other property, thereby creating a basic possibility for them to be owned. The authors prove why a person has ownership in their separated body parts and provide a critical analysis of other theories of rights in the human body, which results in establishing that the concepts that do not refer to the right of ownership entail infringement of human rights and the inability to restore their interests to the fullest extent. Only a clear adherence to the dogma of ownership in body parts will protect the memory of the deceased Mrs Lacks and prevent her rights and those of her descendants from being trampled upon, while at the same time opening the way and setting a precedent for the protection of the rights of others in a similar situation.
Shevelev, Arseny and Shevelev, Georgy, Defending Henrietta Lacks: Justification of Ownership Rights in Separated Human Body Parts (April 21, 2022). Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, volume 55, October, 2022.
First posted 2022-05-31 12:45:14
Leave a Reply