In its function as a bioethical advisory body, the German Ethics Council has the task of drawing up statements and recommendations for political or legislative action.
The work of the council is supported by an administrative office, which is located in Berlin at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (in German: Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften).
[10] Further formats include: conferences that take place annually in autumn and are organised at different locations, for example in Erfurt in 2023 on the topic of „Lost in “Metaverse’’?
On the Intertwining of Real and Digital Worlds“; hearings with experts, usually in the course of preparing Opinions; online events, for example in December 2023 on the topic of „AI in the Classroom – Ethical Questions on ChatGPT and Similar Applications“.
Only the four members appointed during the current period, 2020 to 2024, Elisabeth Gräb-Schmidt, Armin Grunwald, Mark Schweda and Judith Simon, remained in office until then.
[14] After the Federal Government named its candidates in mid-October 2024, six months late, all members were appointed by the President of the Bundestag, Bärbel Bas, with effect from 10 October for the new term of office.
[15] Since the AfD-proposed gynaecologist Ronald Weikl, who was sentenced to a suspended prison term for issuing unlawful certificates for exemption from the mask requirement, was rejected by the Bundestag, the Ethics Council has only 25 members instead of 26.
[17] On 28 May 2020, the council members elected medical ethicist Alena Buyx as its chair, and as its vice-chairs the lawyer Volker Lipp, the philosopher Julian Nida-Rümelin and the theoretical neuroscientist Susanne Schreiber.
[25] The council's Opinion “Medical benefits and costs in healthcare”, published on 27 January 2011, deals with the question of the allocation of funds in the health care sector.
[26] In this Opinion, published on 8 March 2011, the council comprehensively sets out the relevant factual position and the decisive arguments of supporters and opponents of permitting preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD).
[28] Upon request of the Federal Government, the Council dedicated its prepared the Opinion “Intersexuality”, published on 23 February 2012, to the situation of intersex people in Germany.
In the case of a minor, such measures should be adopted only if absolutely necessary for safeguarding the child's well-being and only after thorough consideration of all their medical, psychological and psychosocial advantages, disadvantages and long-term consequences.
Outpatient communal housing and residential communities for persons with dementia should be expanded and the effort of caring family members more widely recognized as well as financially supported.
Further, the Council recommends legally binding regulations and calls upon the scientific community and the federal government to promote the development of biosecurity codes of conduct for responsible research both within the EU and at a global level.
The Council aims for an open and unprejudiced discussion of the juridical and ethical issues arising in the context of close-relative relationships, focusing on consensual coitus between adults.
Particular attention is given the case of sexual contact between (half) siblings that share a family unit and bonds lived in practice no longer exist – a possible aftermath of a divorce or sperm donation for example.
The evaluation is based on the weighing between clashing fundamental values, particularly how the right of sexual autonomy relates to the obligation to protect family structures.
[32] An Opinion, published 24 February 2015, addresses the ethical and legal aspects concerning brain death and their implications regarding organ donation.
The Council discusses the questions arising from the transfer of so-called surplus embryos to a third party for the purpose of carrying them out and assuming permanent parental responsibility.
Taking special account of the child's welfare, the Council considers it to be ethically necessary to legally specify the framework conditions of embryo donation and adoption.
The Council formulates recommendations that aim to enshrine and guarantee the orientation on patient welfare in hospital care, including for instance improvements in the areas of communication, documentation, digitalization, and accessibility.
The Council examined these trends in a two-and-a-half year long process that involved extensive exchanges with experts and interested members of the public.
In its Opinion, published 27 June 2019, the Council states that it is not a purely private matter, but rather a moral duty to have oneself and one's own children vaccinated against a highly contagious infectious disease such as measles.
However, the Council recommends a number of other measures, which, taken together, could be suitable to close any remaining vaccination gaps and achieve the goal of eliminating measles permanently.
[38] In its Opinion, published 9 May 2019, the Council examines whether interventions in the human germline could be at all justifiable and according to which criteria the ethical admissibility of specific applications can be decided.
The analysis is based on eight ethical concepts: human dignity, protection of life and integrity, freedom, naturalness, non-maleficence and beneficence, justice, solidarity and responsibility.
The Council members come up with seven unanimous recommendations, including a call for an application moratorium, but also the agreement that the human germline is not categorically inviolable.
Political justification for this policy derives from urgent infrastructural, personnel and financial problems resulting from the increasing number of people in need of care and assistance and the worsening shortage of nursing staff.
The realization of this potential, however, requires that the use of robots does not replace interpersonal relationships, that it is not used against the will of (professional) caregivers and people in need of care or merely to maximize efficiency, and that those affected by the techniques can also participate in their development.
For example, trilateral meetings with the British Nuffield Council on Bioethics and the French Comité consultatif national d’éthique took place in Berlin in 2009, 2012, 2016 and 2019.