The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has raised concerns about a range of freedom of conscience questions related to protection of life issues and supports including conscience provisions in proposed funding bills.

This article describes how activists in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates are encouraging expatriates to dress modestly and respect local culture.

“American Muslim women discuss their choice to unveil; many now wear the headscarf only for prayers.”

David Orentlicher, a physician and lawyer, co-directs the health law program and teaches law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He is an expert in bioethics, health law, health-care planning and abortion and previously served as director of the American Medical Association’s Division of Ethics Standards.

Psychology professor Richard L. Wiener lead a research team at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln that studied the impact of law on everyday behavior, the implementation of law in the legal system, and the fit between the law and assumptions about human conduct. The team has studied hospital ethics boards’ end-of-life recommendations.

Ruth Gaare Bernheim, an attorney and public health expert, is associate director of the University of Virginia Institute for Practical Ethics and Public Life. She has served as an adviser to numerous hospital ethics boards and has taught a course on ethical issues in the evolving care delivery system.

The Maryland Healthcare Ethics Committee Network, established by the Law and Health Care Program at the University of Maryland School of Law, serves as a resource for ethics committees. Contact chairwoman Diane Hoffman.

The American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics, based in Boston, aims to be a forum for debate, scholarship and critical thought among professionals who work at the intersection of law, health care and ethics. Contact executive director Ted Hutchinson.

Rochelle Millen is a religion professor at Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio, and author of Women, Birth, and Death in Jewish Law and Practice (University Press of New England, 2004), which examines the role of women in Jewish funerals.