Françoise Elvina Baylis CM ONS FRSC FISC (born 1961) is a Canadian bioethicist whose work is at the intersection of applied ethics, health policy, and practice.

[8] The title of her PhD thesis is "The ethics of ex utero research on spare IVF human embryos"[9] and was completed under the supervision of Benjamin Freedman.

In this regard, Baylis’ work has helped to ensure a venue for publication of feminist bioethics authors with the International Journal of FAB.

[8] As an example of her efforts at shaping public policy, she has prepared expert testimony for a number of Courts and Canadian Parliamentary Committees for a diversity of bioethics issues,[79][80] including ethics in the context of clinical trials[81][82] and governance of assisted human reproduction.

"[85] Baylis understands her duties as an academic to help build and cultivate informed, public debate in order to improve the quality of democracy.

[78] Speaking as the leader of the NTE Impact Ethics research group she has said: "Our big-picture goal is to support democracy by helping people to understand what the issues are and what is at stake and how they can then think about and position themselves vis-à-vis the science.

Since 2011, Baylis has used her second tenure as a Canada Research Chair to focus on "developing new strategies that would allow bioethicists to make just and lasting policy contributions.

"[86] Her research projects on "impact ethics"[87] include an emphasis on knowledge translation and mobilization which aim to implement in policy and practice a bioethics that is "responsible", "accountable" and "innovative"[3]—a bioethics that can "make a difference"[3] in serving the public by requiring from those who work in the field to act with "integrity and sensitivity to the real world of healthcare delivery, policy-making and politics.

"[87] A specific arm of these various projects is the Impact Ethics blog[86] which publishes submissions from a range of authors (students and faculty, academics, and writers outside of academia) with various perspectives on a diversity of subjects for bioethical debate.