Our ultimate goal is to improve the conduct of human subjects research in Pakistan and the Islamic world by strengthening capacity in bioethics and particularly in research ethics. ? ? The specific objectives of this planning grant are: ? ? 1. To DEVELOP HUMAN RESOURCES to be able to mount a successful training grant application for a Masters in Bioethics in two years time. ? ? 2. To DEVELOP CURRICULUM AND TRAINING PROGRAM for a Masters Program in Bioethics. ? ? 3. To DEVELOP A NETWORK for training our faculty and curriculum development, recruitment of future trainees and for sharing of human and material resources amongst national and regional centers. ? ? The successful implementation of this planning grant would help us prepare a successful training grant application in 2004. The planning grant would lead to development of a Bioethics Center at the Aga Khan University (AKU), which is one of the premier educational and research institutes of Pakistan, South Asia and the Islamic world. ? ? The benefits of a training program I bioethics centre in Pakistan at AKU include: (1) building on 17 years of previous bioethics development at AKU, (2) building on North-South partnerships with funded FIC programs at Toronto, Johns Hopkins, Harvard, Cape Town, and Pretoria, (3) providing a culturally sensitive and very economical model for training, (4) capacity building and dissemination of curriculum and other training programs in Pakistan and the region especially the Muslim world, (5) providing a gateway to bioethics in the Islamic world as the first FIC bioethics grant in the Islamic world. The latter is a crucial step in the current geopolitical environment.
