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Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2020; 11 (2): 10-20 

 

10 

 

Reflections of the Ethics on Coexisting with Disaster 

 

H.W. Angela Lo 1, Vincent Shieh 2 , Yung-Jong Shiah 3 

2. Ed.D., Associate Professor, School of Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University, Kaohsiung. 

Taiwan. Email: loha@kmu.edu.tw  
3. Ed.D., Professor, Graduate Institution of Gender Education National Kaohsiung Normal University 

Kaohsiung, Taiwan. Email: vshieh@nknu.edu.tw  

3. PhD, Professor, Graduate Institute of Counseling, Psychology and Rehabilitation Counseling, National 

Kaohsiung Normal University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan. Email: shiah@nknu.edu.tw  

  DOI: https://doi.org/10.3329/bioethics.v11i2.49259  

 

Abstract: With the increasing number of human disasters in recent years, disaster service 

workers are faced with an ever-growing challenge of criticism concerning their professional 

competence. The workers also realize the limitation inherent in their practice, as well as 

bioethics problems regarding autonomy and heteronomy. Therefore, professionals and 

researchers of human service devote to the issue of post-disaster rehabilitation of the people so 

as to identify an effective way and practice to aid the post-disaster individual, family and 

community. This study explores the effectiveness of rehabilitative function of disaster service 

workers through the action research of Typhoon Morakot and the 2014 Gas Explosion in 

Kaohsiung City, Taiwan. The case studies serve as a platform for the discussion of principles 

of bioethics and the analysis of the process of self-discipline of the workers of human services 

in hope of ultimately establishing bioethical principles for heteronomy during disasters and 

work indicators for post-disaster community restoration. Discuss Issues are 1. How can self-

discipline in bioethics be achieved for the human service workers during times of disaster? 2. 

In post-disaster reconstruction, how does the human service worker take into account bioethical 

principles to serve and partake in the restoration of the post- disaster life of community 

residents? 3.During the process of a disaster research, what are the bioethical considerations to 

be taken into for the test subjects? Conclusion and suggestions are to formulate indicators for 

a post-disaster “community of health and wellness;” to establish bioethical principles of 

heteronomy for disaster service workers. 

 

Key words: Disaster, reconstruction, human services, bio-ethics, self- discipline, heteronomy  

 

Definitions: 

1. Autonomous Ethics: National Education 

Institute (2012) the term “autonomy” 

means self-discipline in Greek1. The 

concept of autonomous ethics originated in 

the seventeenth and eighteenth century by 

British scholars. They hypothesized the 

existence of a special sense of morality that 

is independent of one’s social experience 

and material needs. Immanuel Kant very  

 

 

specifically described autonomous ethics as 

the derivation of principles from intrinsic 

ethics, which emphasizes the individuality 

and inherent value of such ethics. Kant 

believes that only by respecting the 

categorical imperative of morality can one 

be truly ethical and free from extrinsic 

moral motivations, such as selfishness, 

pursuit of joy, and social status. 



Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2020; 11 (2): 10-20 

 

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From a Marxist standpoint, the dilemma 

between autonomous ethics and 

heteronomous ethics is superficial. The 

origin of ethics is beyond its limits and 

in this sense, ethics is both 

heteronomous and autonomous, has its 

own peculiarity and logical 

development, all of which cannot be 

inferred from objective economic 

factors1.  

 

2. Heteronomous ethics: “Heteronomous 

ethics” means the discipline of others. It is 

achieved by establishing morality on 

others, such as hedonism, eudemonism, and 

utilitarianism. The concept of autonomous 

ethics is opposite of heteronomy. 

Heteronomous ethics then refer to the 

derivation of moral principles that are never 

dependent on the extrinsic factors of free 

will (such as God’s will, social norms, and 

instinctual feelings)2.  

 

3. Bioethics: The definition of bioethics 

concerns with the issues that arise from the 

interrelationship among fields such as 

biology, medicine, politics, law and 

sociology. The degree of ethical 

judgements that biological issues should be 

subject to is controversial. Some experts of 

bioethics limit the ethical judgement to the 

ethics involved in medicine, technological 

innovations, and the medical treatment 

received by the human body, whereas other 

scholars extend their ethical judgement to 

the entire biological entity that is capable of 

experience a gamut of emotions, such as 

fear and pain3. 

 

4. The Definition of a Humanized Disaster 

Service: The United States Department of 

Health and Human Services (HHS) 

determines that the concept of disaster 

human services lie in providing humanistic 

service through coordinating and guiding 

public policy and its services, as well as 

taking preventive measures in preparation 

for disasters and sudden public health 

events 4. 

 

Background: Disasters are capable of 

inflicting destruction on a massive scale, 

causing much damage and casualty, 

occupying much of the local resources, and 

often times requiring additional aid and 

manpower in reconstruction. Such process 

can lead to challenges faced by disaster 

service workers on a bioethical level. The 

bioethical principles and beliefs of disaster 

service workers revolve around promoting 

the wellbeing of mankind and the health of 

communities and the environment, making 

right decisions in human aid and 

minimizing potential hazards. Nevertheless, 

in times of disasters, many ethical dilemmas 

may arise and thus, more effort is needed to 

achieve an optimal balance between 

individual and collective rights. 

There are different types of workers 

(professional and non-professional, GO and 

NGO) that devote to different stages of 

disaster service (such as emergency rescue, 

post-disaster settlement, post-disaster 

reconstruction). The interaction between 

workers and disaster victims can be 

complex and diversified. Decisions are 

frequently made based on the limited 

resources that are available and potential 

problems may often develop.  

This article serves to explore the bioethical 

principles behind the effectiveness of 

disaster service workers in restoring 

community function based on the action 

study of the Typhoon Morakot disaster and 



Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2020; 11 (2): 10-20 

 

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the 2014 gas explosion in Kaohsiung, 

Taiwan in hope of inspecting some of the 

bioethical quandaries inherent in post-

disaster community reconstruction. 

When it comes to disaster service workers 

and disaster victims, in addition to the 

objective and subjective discrepancies in 

their bioethical values, differences also 

exist in the time, location, and degree of the 

disaster itself. Therefore, there must not be 

a universally standardized answer for 

bioethical questions. Pertaining to disaster 

laws and regulations that govern 

professional disaster service organizations, 

the most important steps are to put forth a 

guideline and restorative plan for medical 

personnel and disaster service workers, to 

establish a committee dedicated to 

community reconstruction, and to train local 

service workers (through bioethical 

empowerment). Heteronomous autonomy 

in disaster prevention law should be 

outlined by the government, especially in 

crisis management of disaster prevention 

and preparation, to minimize the damage of 

disaster on society. 

 

Research questions and discussion: 

1. How can disaster service workers 

achieve autonomous bioethics in face of 

disaster? Action with autonomous 

bioethics has always been a focus in the 

training of disaster service workers. 

Therefore, as Mark S. Putnam (2006) had 

mentioned, if the worker can have a firm 

grasp of the abstract concept of work life of 

autonomous ethics, the resultant disaster 

restoration work that follows can become 

more ethical 5. 

As outlined by Mark S. Putnam (2oo6), the 

authors of this article shall explore the ten 

principles of autonomous ethics through a 

case study in hope of shedding light on how 

a service worker can act in line with 

autonomous ethics in times of disaster5: 

1.) Respect for human life: One’s attitude 

and action in autonomous bioethics shall 

determine one’s work effectiveness. 

Autonomy can make one fulfill one’s 

wishes and make the right choice. 

Autonomous ethics can only be realized 

through a sincere desire to help others with 

a victim-centered mindset. 

2.) Learning bioethics: Educating oneself in 

the principles of bioethics to prevent 

Making ignorant mistakes. Learning the 

highest moral standards of bioethics may be 

more important than learning the law and 

regulations, policies, and standard 

operating procedures. However not 

knowing what the rules are will never allow 

one to make the right bioethical decisions. 

3.) Sharing of responsibilities. Service 

workers of post-disaster reconstruction 

must be willing to shoulder responsibilities 

and accept setbacks without casting blame 

on others. The covering up of mistakes can 

only worsen and even result in a personal 

ethical crisis. 

4.) Taking action: Autonomous ethics is a 

part of the self-discipline required of post-

disaster service workers. Self-discipline is 

never an observer’s activity. It requires 

taking action, overcoming personal 

obstacles, learning from mistakes and 

successes, and doing the right things. 

5) Eradicating destructive habits: There are 

countless suboptimal individual habits. As 

service workers, everyone has their own 

habits and ways of doing things. No matter 

what one’s style or habit is, a major 



Bangladesh Journal of Bioethics 2020; 11 (2): 10-20 

 

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principle is to eradicate all harmful habits 

from the workplace. 

6.) Setting and completing goals: A primary 

goal is to engage victims of the disaster-

stricken community in collective learning 

and nothing else if more satisfying and all-

beneficial. The service worker must act 

according to the expectations of the 

community residents and be courageous 

enough to stand firm on moral grounds. 

7.) Clear explanation of service work: Post-

disaster human service worker must 

achieve communication and mutual 

understanding with residents of the local 

community on community restoration. 

Dependability is a valuable trait at the 

workplace as it reflects one’s moral 

honesty. 

8.) Ignoring peer pressure: Peer pressure 

among disaster victims and service workers 

is often neglected by the service workers 

themselves. No matter how seemingly 

independent or irrelevant, every task in 

community reconstruction always concerns 

with individual participation and collective 

learning to a certain extent. Challenges and 

variability are present, even in the most 

seemingly fair activities such as resource 

allocation. One must adhere to one’s 

bioethical principles. 

9.) Engage in activities that reinforce self-

discipline: Service workers must 

understand that other than relieving stress, 

one must also pick up activities that one 

enjoy, whether it be sports or playing a 

musical instrument. A spiritually-healthy 

service worker can more effectively help 

and contribute to post-disaster 

reconstruction. In other words, self-

discipline can instill energy and eventually 

empower the local residents. 

10.) Persistent passion: Service workers 

must realize that bioethical principles are 

not shallow. All the work must be centered 

on the victims and humanitarianism must 

always be present. After all, the most 

fundamental principles of bioethics shall 

never change and therefore, post-disaster 

community restoration can be expected5. 

 

2. In the process of post-disaster 

reconstruction, how should a “human 

service worker” consider the principle of 

bioethics to serve the disastrous 

community and help inhabitants to join 

the recuperation of healthy life? In the 

process of post-disaster reconstruction how 

should a human service worker consider the 

principle of bioethics as a primary service 

for “Disastrous Victims” in each individual 

case? Intuitive to say, how shall the human 

services worker in post- disaster 

reconstruction exercise the principle of 

bioethics to serve the disastrous community 

and assist inhabitants in joining the 

rehabilitation of healthy life, and how to 

consider and verify the bioethical value and 

unequivocal principle, as well as its 

applicable manners6?  

The conception of bioethical principle is 

that the human services worker in the 

process of post-disaster reconstruction shall 

center on the “damaged community and 

inhabitant” to proceed with humanistic 

care, thus, most inhabitants in disastrous 

district convince and appreciate the human 

services workers’ contribution towards the 

post-disaster reconstruction. The said 

workers shall enact and participate the 

rehabilitating project of healthy life, the 

purpose of which is to differentiate from 

other opponents’ groups and the 

substitutions for inhabitants in the post-



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disaster reconstruction district; the idea to 

provide the maximum benefit seems 

rational and self-evident if inhabitants may 

join in the recuperation of healthy life 7.  

 

Furthermore, the recuperating project 

of healthy life is enacted prior to the 

promulgation of post-disaster 

reconstruction. It is an opportunity for 

inhabitants in disastrous district able to join 

the rehabilitation of healthy life that makes 

him or her comprehend the importance to 

participate in such an activity and consent 

to perform the said project. In addition, the 

human services worker shall have 

inhabitants in disastrous district understand 

and value the living reconstruction welfare, 

and shall fairly and justly distribute the 

service resources in accordance with the 

personal requirement and healthy life. 

 

1.The principle of respect for autonomy: 

The notion of moral policy decision is 

presuming that all rational acts are deriving 

from volunteering decision. The policy 

adopted by human services worker must be 

respect for autonomy of the inhabitants in 

disastrous district, which means, the 

inhabitants shall have the option whether to 

participate in the recovering action or not. 

The social workers cannot violate 

inhabitants’ principle of autonomy and 

create any impact on their free and 

volunteer behaviors. The said principle is 

also inclusive of the “Informed Consent” in 

the process of post-disaster reconstruction 

to interflow with human services worker 

/inhabitants in disastrous district, basic 

upon the practice of healthy community and 

hygienic health 8.  

Case 1: During the Typhoon Morako, 

Village Shiaolin was perished with a death 

toll of 498 persons and more than one-

hundred survivors. Thereupon, many NGO 

Organizations, professionals and 

volunteers crowded into this area; as one of 

the professionals told villagers that “he 

wants to help them to do the psychological 

therapy”, everybody was running away and 

no one would accept the offer. Why? 

Discussion and Analyses: Villagers’ 

cognition is, “This is an act of God /my 

house is gone/my relatives are dead…” I am 

a normal person, and surely will cry, or feel 

miserable and sad. I am in my right mind --

- “not mad”, and my psychology is out of 

question; why should I be treated by 

psychological therapy?  It’s peculiar… 

The social worker X said, they must have 

psychological problem… trauma~ must 

have PDST’s issues! They just don’t 

understand~ they must accept the 

psychological treatment! I help them to do 

the psychological therapy with good 

intentions, but they bite the hand that feeds 

them----.  

We may clearly see the difference of 

cultural significance between race and 

religion. The human services worker shall 

always respect inhabitants’ autonomy; the 

respecting behavior is not a simple attitude, 

he forget the rule of professional ethics. 

“To respect every one and each autonomy” 

and “Center on individual case”. 

Regretfully, in this case, the professional is 

simply “centering on his own expertise” 

 

2. The Principle of Non-maleficence: The 

principle of practicing charity demands 

human services worker, through act or 

omission, not to cause any damage 

intentionally or to hurt the inhabitants in 

disastrous district. According to the 



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language of common ground, we assumed, 

an offence is to impose a negligence or 

unreasonable risk onto others. Jesus and 

Michael argued, the offer of an appropriate 

virtue and humanistic care can avoid or 

reduce the damage risk, and the standard 

support is not only for our prevalent moral 

belief, but also for the social law (please 

refer to Law and Medicine Ethics)9. To 

clarify this principle needs to provide the 

professional capability, obviously, it may 

appear with the hypocrite who takes 

advantage of the prestige of good deeds to 

publish others’ privacy onto its articles, 

however, the principle of practicing charity 

expounds that social worker shall provide 

benefits and protect the inhabitant in 

disastrous district from injury. 

 

Case 2: After Village Shiaolin was 

perished, some school teachers were 

deployed to accompany survivors. Two 

months later, these teachers held a seminar 

to make public of survivor’s oral history 

and life story; is this behavior not respectful 

enough to the deceased and the survivor? Is 

it violating the studying morality? Why? 

Discussion and Analyses: In the duration of 

disaster, many social workers (GO & NGO; 

school, hospital, and enterprise) made use 

of the name of “Accompanists” to collect 

the variously oral histories and 

interviewing paper data. The survivor who 

accepted the interview knows that this is a 

research, and that his words of “personal 

privacy, sadness, and misery” are being 

published at the seminar --- this is what we 

called “In violation of researching 

morality”. In another words, the researcher 

shall prudentially consider the equity issue 

of the vulnerable interviewees (survivors 

who had experienced the disaster); there 

four moral principles in terms of 

consideration: respect for autonomy 

(informed consent/confidentiality), in favor 

of interviewee, and no harm to 

interviewees. 

It is applicable to the principle of dual 

effects: 1). Nature of the good deeds shall 

not be itself error; 2). It shall be a good, or 

at least a favorable behavior in terms of 

ethical morality; even it is foreseeable as a 

good result, it shall still be not to cause any 

evil influence. In the aforesaid case, there is 

a professional difference between 

hypocrites and professionals who keep 

survivors company in the process of 

therapy. We conclude, it is a harmful action 

if a professional not specialized in 

psychology is doing the psychological job. 

It will surely cause the secondary harm onto 

the survivor and the inferior influence 

which is not the good deeds but the evil job 

made by human services worker. 

 

3. The Principle of Beneficences: Common 

significance of the favorable principle is 

that human services workers have the 

responsibility to provide benefits for 

inhabitants in disastrous district, and shall 

adopt the active measures to prevent and 

eliminate jeopardies on them 10. The duties 

of post-disaster reconstruction and 

recuperating job is regarded as reasonable 

and self-evident to serve as an appropriate 

target for post-disaster reconstruction. The 

favorable principle is that the human 

services worker facing the inhabitant in 

disastrous district can enter and join the 

reconstruction, healthy life service, and 

medical services provided by authorized 

organization. Good deed in favor of 

affected inhabitants is a constant obligation, 

thus, human services worker shall always 

do the right thing rather than jeopardize 

another individual while human services 



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workers’ good deed is a kind of limited 

obligation, which is to work for inhabitants 

in disastrous district. 

Case 3: Upon occurrence of the gas 

explosion many NGO organizations, 

experts, and volunteers, or even artists 

(home or abroad) were deployed in this 

area, the purpose of which is to help victims 

to join in the artistic treatment. 

Nevertheless, inhabitants in disastrous 

district joined the project with low 

willingness, hence, the artists or student 

volunteers can only paint the graffiti by 

themselves. Will these images appearing on 

public space have the curative effect onto 

inhabitants? 

Discussion and Analyses: The original 

intention is very good, but inhabitants’ 

willingness to join the project is pretty low; 

isn’t it specified the inhabitants’ 

requirement variety? In the project of 

rehabilitating work, what human services 

worker have done is no other than the 

unilaterally wishful thinking; if the 

inhabitants don’t like those images, will the 

picture cause visual interference or show no 

deference? Besides, the wrong service 

strategy and timing may also affect the 

inhabitants’ daily living. Are these artists 

really doing good deeds? If only the victims 

fail to participate in the graffiti, it 

represents, as a matter of fact, they cannot 

perceive the benefit or curative effect 

Another evident example consists in 

hygienic health. The benefaction principle 

is preferential to take care of the patients 

living in disaster area and respect their 

autonomy. The case is coming from the 

disaster medicine; as the inhabitants are 

seriously affected by gas explosion and 

becoming disabled or ill, our government is 

based on the humanism to provide medical 

care actively and reasonably, and enacts the 

Rehabilitation Act to rescue wounded 

personnel and provide benignant 

interference in favor of victims. 

 

4. Principle of fairness and justice: In the 

process of post-disaster reconstruction, 

human services workers’ bioethics 

principle is commonly defined as a 

professional morality to help others. The 

principle of fairness and justice is exactly as 

what Aristotle said, “Each service we 

attentively provided is what the victim 

(who lives in disaster district) deserved”11. 

It means, the fair distribution of social 

resources is demanding us to provide the 

deserved equity for victims, the issue of 

which is seemingly to hinge on the fair 

distribution of some resources and services, 

not but that the supply is unable to meet.  

 

Case 4: Upon occurrence of air blast, lots 

of the NGO organization, professional, 

volunteer, human services worker, and the 

church group crowded into the disaster 

district to help victims. As to the church 

elders’ healthy living care, non-

parishioners were indifferent to join the 

church activities, thus, the church groups 

opened the volunteer quota for residents 

who are not living in disaster district. Is it 

fair to the inhabitants who living in 

disastrous district when the said residents 

are using the resources that belong to the 

disastrous district? 

Discussion and Analyses: For Taiwan 

contains the diverse, complicated, and rich 

society implications, social workers must 

learn of the disparity amid the factors of 

culture, race, hierarchy, gender, and age. 

Only the diverse culture thinking can help 

human services worker to achieve the 



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service job basic upon the fair and just 

society value in the process of collecting 

research information while the experience 

and wisdom accumulated in these 

disastrous events can be used as references 

of the disaster prevention, alleviation, and 

preparedness. 

The bidding-type research and the human 

service work have caused unwholesome 

influences onto the straitened victims; for 

the temptation of money and materials 

compels victims having no choice, which is 

not only causing harms to the studying 

participants, but also twisting the human 

service expertise and the studying 

significance and value. The human services 

worker with administrative resources and 

academic halo sometimes may form a habit 

to use strong-hand tactics in persuasion, 

therefore, the harmful servicing habit must 

be eliminated, otherwise, it could seriously 

affect the rehabilitation of disastrous 

district and violate the morality of human 

service job. 

 

3. In the duration of disastrous research, 

is the bioethics principle being 

considered while victims participate into 

the studying process? The participant or 

statutory agent in disastrous researches is 

entitled to learn of the possible risk and 

potential consequence. Exercising the right 

of informed consent, the researchers shall 

expound the studying purpose onto the 

message provider, participant, and statutory 

agent, and submit the application to the 

Committee, so as to accept the assessment 

and investigation. The testees joining in the 

disastrous research are the vulnerable group 

according to the bioethics principle, hence, 

a lot of particularities shall be strictly in 

accordance with the statute of researching 

morality to make a judgment on the integral 

value assessed by human behavior12. In 

addition to the consideration of bioethics 

principle, the testee joining in the studying 

process is inclusive of the morality and 

statute acceptable to the testee (either 

human or human body). There are four 

principles involved in human testee’s 

bioethics research, respective as the respect 

for autonomy, good deeds, no harm, and the 

principle of fairness and justice. 

1. Respect for autonomy. Respect for 

autonomy at least includes two bioethics 

convictions; 1). Disastrous research--- the 

testee has the right of informed consent, and 

2). The disabled person (loss of autonomy) 

shall be well protected. The principle of 

respects for individuals can be divided into 

two requirements respectively as 1). 

Acknowledge the autonomy; 2). Protect the 

disabled personnel. The information 

provider and the studying participant are 

entitled to keep the confidentiality. The 

legal research shall adopt appropriate 

measures to protect participants and 

relevant information; even the absolute 

confidentiality is unable to be achieved, the 

research shall keep the participant informed 

of the protective restriction, and try to his 

best endeavor to protect the achievement. 

The information provider and the research 

shall be advised --- even we have done our 

best to protect the confidentiality, it still has 

many possibilities to be revealed. 

Beneficence deeds: Use the highest 

morality level to treat the human 

researching testee. In addition to doing 

things in favor of the research testee, we 

shall respect their decision, protect their 

equity to avoid any harm, and safeguard 

their wellbeing; this is the principle of good 

deeds, including the benevolent behaviors 

that transcend the extent of obligation. 



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No harm: Not to harm the testee represents 

the responsibility and obligation. There are 

two basic principles being used to 

supplement the description of good deeds: 

1). No harm; 2). Try every possible to 

increase the benefit and reduce the potential 

jeopardy. 

Fairness and justice: “Who shall assume the 

liability and enjoy the benefit brought by 

researching findings?” The justice principle 

is to explore the fair distribution and the 

issue whether it shall be deserved or not. 

There is no reason to refuse a deserved 

beneficiary while excessive duty 

assignment will cause harms. Another 

manner to perform the justice principle is 

equality (that shall be fairly treated). In 

another words, who is the equal party, who 

is not, and how to verify the fair 

distribution? 

 

Conclusion and Suggestions: In response 

to the abovementioned issues, the author 

suggests to enact an explicit statute of the 

“Disaster Prevention and Protection Act” in 

respect of the post-disaster reconstruction. 

The statutory research on disaster 

prevention and protection is very important 

policy foundation, and the government 

must effectively record all experiences and 

lessons, and shall enact a set of the “System 

of disaster prevention and protection” and 

the policy in relation to post-disaster 

recuperation, inclusive of the assessing 

index and enforcement rule in regard to the 

community recovery or the healthy and 

blissful community. The policy and the 

enforcement rules shall also be established 

to aim at the spirit to face disaster, the 

PDST, medicine, individual psychology 

therapy, and the community-mental 

hygiene. 

Law and order in the disaster period is very 

important, which is the lowest (standard) 

demand. Without sources of law to serve as 

a foundation, the moral autonomy or 

heteronomy shall still be limited, even with 

the higher moral criteria to demand social 

workers to observe the rules. In conclusion, 

the author would like to present the human 

services workers’ “Bioethics heteronomy 

norm” to our government for references to 

conclude the content of “Disaster 

Prevention and Protection Act” and to 

those social workers for references to 

practice the works of post-disaster 

reconstruction. Human services worker s’ 

moral heteronomy is primarily to establish 

an exterior norm. 

Bioethics shall be a branch of moral 

tradition outside the Law; it concerns with 

the application of human bioethics value 

and theory. As to the moral heteronomy, it 

is aiming at the good or evil of human 

morality to serve as an index norm. The 

code of conduct in the volition exercise will 

become a popular and feasible law, then, 

the heteronomy must not be affected by any 

personal benefit. The bioethics heteronomy 

norm is proposed with following opinions 

for human services workers and 

researchers: 

1) Human services workers and 

researchers’ human subject experiment 

shall not use other researches or 

implements, but can adopt only under the 

deliberate and essential circumstance. 2) 

Human services worker and researchers 

shall be designed for serving people, 

helping human health and life, benefiting 

learning, or using knowledge of other life 

experiences and issues in researches, then, 

allowing the expected result able to prove 

the principle of reciprocity in the 

researching experiment. 3) Human services 



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worker s and researchers shall avoid any 

unnecessarily physical and psychological 

pain and damage. 4) Human services 

workers and researchers themselves can act 

as the teste; no researching experiment is 

allowed if there is a reason beforehand to 

believe it could cause the damage. 5) 

Human services workers and researchers’ 

risk shall not surpass the importance of 

human consideration in respect of the issue 

that can be resolved by service. 6) Human 

services workers and researchers shall have 

the proper facilities to protect victims or 

testees, or even to safeguard the rarely 

mental and physical injuria. 7).Only the 

qualified person who has accepted the 

scientific training in terms of the humanity, 

psychology, and social medicine can 

conduct, as the human services worker, the 

researching experiment in the disastrous 

district. Principal investigator or the 

researcher shall have the high-level 

humanistic communicating skill and the 

caring bosom in each phase of the 

researching experiment. 8) If the victim or 

testee in the duration of studying period 

feels his/her mental and physical status 

impossible to hold on, then, the victim or 

testee can freely make a decision to 

terminate the participation in this research. 

9) In the process of researching experiment, 

personnel in charge of the said experiment, 

or the human services worker can 

immediately stop the experiment under 

his/her sincere and prudential judgment if 

he/she assumed, according to the 

reasonable factors, that continuance of the 

researching experiment could cause victims 

or testees’ injury, disablement, or death. 

 

 

 

References:  

1.National Education Institute (2012 ) 

http://terms.naer.edu.tw/detail/1305179/?index=38 

(Accessed on July 2019) 

2. Mobile phone interactive encyclopedia 

http://www.baike.com/wiki/%E8%87%AA%E5%B

E%8B%E4%B8%8E%E4%BB 

%96%E5%BE%8B  (Accessed on OCT 2019). 

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https://zh.wikipedia.org/zhtw/%E7%94%9F%E7%8

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Literature discussed:  

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E., Armstrong, J.H. and James, J.J. (2008), “Disaster 

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For further advice contact: Lifeline 13 11 14 

Canberra Connect 13 22 81 Community Recovery 

and Emergency Planning 



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http://www.communityservices.act.gov.au/ 

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18 National Organization on Disability. (2008) 

Prepare yourself; disaster readiness tips for people 

with disabilities. Washington, DC: National 

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MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. 

21. Sara Kathleen Geale, (2012),"The ethics of 

disaster management", Disaster Prevention and 

Management, Vol. 21 Is: 4 pp. 445 – 462 Permanent 

link to this document: 

http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/09653561211256152 

http://www.fiamc.org/bioethics/ethics-of-disaster-

medicine/ 

22. Thomas R. McCormick, Doming., Senior 

Lecturer Emeritus, Dept. Bioethics and Humanities, 

School of Medicine, University of 

Washington 

https://depts.washington.edu/bioethx/tools/princpl.

html  (Accessed on OCT 2019).  

 

Author Contributions: The 1st author H.W. 

Angela Lo conceived the idea, did the literature 

review and wrote the manuscript. The 2nd author 

and Vincent Shieh guideded the conception of 

the idea, the manuscript writing, and checked the 

manuscript and 3rd authors Yung-Jong Shiah 

involved in manuscript writing, and checked the 

manuscript meticulously. 

 

Conflict of Intereste: The authors declare that there 

is no conflict of interest in this study 

 

 



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