Mandate of establishing an ethical review committee

The National Bioethics Committee (NBC) was approved by the Government of Pakistan in 2004. Its basic mandate is to “promote and facilitate ethical health services delivery and health related research. The secretariat of NBC is the Pakistan Medical Research Council (PMRC) under Ministry of Health Government of Pakistan. A Code of Ethics has been issued by Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) and according to this code all research protocols must be reviewed by an Ethical Review Committee (ERC) at their local institute. A 15- member committee which comprises of faculty from basic sciences, representatives from social science departments, clinicians, a person with knowledge of ethics of medical research and a lay person is an ideal team. This is essential to cater to the well being of patients and safety of research. In this way the importance of ethics will be realized by all health providers. The ERC should inculcate the sense of ethics in health providers and must be realized as an important component of any institutio