Ethical Aspects regarding Acute Intoxication in Children

The increase of frequency of intoxications in children in recent decades is determined by the industrialization degree, the technical progress, and to the increase of life standards. Therefore, intoxications were included among the civilization specific diseases, having important medicalsocial and bioethical repercussions, requiring expensive and long-term care and producing much human suffering which can sometimes lead to the death of the patient. Intoxications in children, by its social-economic implications, represent at present a major problem of Public Health and Bioethics. The published statistical studies suggest that in Europe, acute intoxications represent the main cause of emergency admission in the developed countries; in developing countries, they represent the main cause of death in children and adolescents. In 2004, World Report assessed that worldwide 7% of the total number of accidental deaths are caused by intoxications. Acute intoxications in children and adolescents place at equal extent medical, social-economical and bioethical problems for doctors. The increasing prevalence of intoxications from an early age represents a warning signal with regard to this problem, which cannot be solved exclusively by medical means.