Okay, so it’s quite like the September issue of Vogue–neither is it 1,000 pages long nor does it set the fashion trends for the upcoming year nor take an entire year to produce. Nor has anyone decided to make a documentary about the exciting AJOB editorial office….yet.

But that said, the September issue of The American Journal of Bioethics is definitely worth reading. Its two Target Articles address important issues in the field. First, Mark Rothstein asks whether the deidentification of health data is sufficient to protect research subjects and concludes that it is a blunt tool that fails in many cases to adequately protect the interests and concerns of most subjects.

Second, McCullough, Chervernak, Hippen and Brent introduce the concept of “transgressive bioethics” as it relates to the writing of a letter of concern by bioethicists who took a stand against research they believed to be unethical. McCullough et al argue themselves that the letter itself and the campaign against the research were in fact the actions that were problematic, not the research itself. Who’s right and who’s wrong? Read the Target Article and the OPCs to decide for yourself!

Summer Johnson, PhD