The Israeli Medical Association hosted the World Medical Association’s (WMA’s) first Expert Meeting on the revision of the WMA Declaration of Helsinki, in December 2022.

The Declaration of Helsinki on the ethical principles for medical research involving human subjects was first adopted by the 18th WMA General Assembly in 1964. Since then, the Declaration has undergone several revisions to keep it up to date.

At the WMA Council meeting in April 2022, a workgroup was established to begin another revision of this important document and the American Medical Association (AMA) was assigned to lead this process.

The first regional expert meeting to discuss this revision was co-organized by the Israeli Medical Association, the American Medical Association and the World Medical Association and was held in Tel Aviv, Israel. This high-level discussion brought both regional and international experts together to consider the first steps of the revision.

The meeting was opened by Israeli Medical Association and World Medical Association Past President, Prof Leonid Eidelman.  Prof Eidelman welcomed the guests to Israel and chaired the first day of the meeting.  Prof. Eidelman noted that: “as physicians it is our duty to ensure that all ethical standards are included in the declaration and upheld by the profession.”

Dr. Osahon Enabulele, President of the World Medical Association, then greeted the participants and gave opening remarks on the importance of the Declaration, also thanking the Israeli Medical Association for hosting the event. 

Unfortunately, both IMA President Prof Zion Hagay and AMA President Dr. Jack Resneck, tested positive for Covid-19 and were not able to be physically present during the meeting, but did manage to connect virtually to join the discussions.

The expert discussions began with a presentation by Dr. Elliott Crigger, Ethics Advisor at the American Medical Association, who presented on Codes of Medical Ethics: Purpose, Structure and Relationship to Regulatory Frameworks.  This was followed by Dr. Urban Wiesing, Professor and Chair of Medical Ethics and the Director of the Institute of History of Medicine at the University of Tuebingen.  Dr Weising, who was also heavily involved with the revision of the WMA’s International Code of Medical Ethics, reviewed the previous revisions of the Declaration of Helsinki and presented an analysis of the literature.

The second day of the meeting began with a presentation from Prof. Avraham Steinberg, a Paediatric Neurologist and Director, Medical Ethics Unit & Chairman, IRB, at Shaare Zedek Medical Center, as well as an Israel Prize laureate in ethics.  Prof Steinberg presented on Big Data and Augmented Intelligence, with a focus on issues related to patient consent for use of their data.  This was followed by Dr. Ritva Halila, the Senior Medical Officer at the Finnish Ministry of Health and Past Chair of Steering Committee for Human Rights in the fields of Biomedicine and Health at the Council of Europe, who also presented on big data, with a focus on understanding possible harms for research subjects. 

Each day of the conference included a panel discussion, where participants held an open discussion about potential areas due for revision.  It was clear from the discussions that a lot of work would be required to reach a consensus.  The next expert meeting was held in Sau Paulo, Brazil in February of this year, where discussions continued.