BACKGROUND The West African Ebola virus epidemic from 2014 to 2016 is unprecedented in its scale, surpassing all previous and subsequent Ebola outbreaks since 1976. This epidemic provoked a humanitarian emergency that extended to different spheres of life, making visible ethical challenges in addition to medical, economic, and social ones. The present article aims to identify and differentiate the scope of ethical issues associated with the Ebola epidemic. METHODS An online media analysis was performed on articles published from March 2014 to September 2015 in ten preselected academic journals (scientific press) and two online newspapers (lay press). Two methodological approaches were combined: a systematic literature search and a qualitative content analysis. An additional keyword search was conducted on the PubMed database for the period after the end of the Ebola epidemic (2016-2020) to obtain an overview of research dealing with medical ethics due to the epidemic and to compare these results with the identified ethical challenges. RESULTS A total of 389 articles dealing with the subject fields "Ebola epidemic" and "ethics" were researched. For qualitative content analysis, the time span with the highest article density was selected and a total of 64 articles were included (15 scientific articles, 49 popular articles). Five core ethical challenges of the Ebola epidemic emerged: 1. Responsibility and Accountability, 2. Spillover Effects, 3. Research and Development, 4. Health Communication, and 5. Resource Allocation. Articles in academic journals were dominated by the discussion of normative aspects in the area of "research and development", while newspaper articles focused on aspects of "responsibility and accountability". CONCLUSION An ethical discussion of the Ebola epidemic requires an examination of as many of the ethical dimensions involved as possible. The presented investigation of the two types of media with regard to the Ebola epidemic offers this possibility of a more comprehensive insight into this diversity as a basis for ethical discussions.

中文翻译：

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确定 2014-2016 年西非埃博拉疫情造成的伦理挑战范围：一项定性研究。

背景 2014 年至 2016 年西非埃博拉病毒疫情规模空前，超过了自 1976 年以来历次和之后的所有埃博拉疫情。这次疫情引发了人道主义紧急情况，并扩展到生活的不同领域，除了医疗、经济的，社会的。本文旨在确定和区分与埃博拉流行病相关的伦理问题的范围。方法 对 2014 年 3 月至 2015 年 9 月期间在十种预选学术期刊（科学出版社）和两家在线报纸（非大众媒体）上发表的文章进行在线媒体分析。结合了两种方法：系统的文献检索和定性内容分析。在埃博拉疫情结束后（2016-2020 年）期间，在 PubMed 数据库上进行了额外的关键字搜索，以获取处理因疫情引起的医学伦理学研究的概况，并将这些结果与已确定的伦理挑战进行比较。结果共检索到涉及“埃博拉流行病”和“伦理学”等学科领域的389篇文章。对于定性内容分析，选择了文章密度最高的时间跨度，共包含 64 篇文章（15 篇科学文章，49 篇热门文章）。出现了埃博拉疫情的五个核心伦理挑战：1. 责任与问责，2. 溢出效应，3. 研究与开发，4. 健康传播，以及 5. 资源分配。学术期刊的文章主要讨论“研究与开发”领域的规范方面，而报纸文章则侧重于“责任与义务”方面的讨论。结论 对埃博拉流行病的伦理讨论需要尽可能多地检查所涉及的伦理维度。所呈现的关于埃博拉流行病的两种类型媒体的调查提供了更全面地洞察这种多样性的可能性，作为伦理讨论的基础。结论 对埃博拉流行病的伦理讨论需要尽可能多地检查所涉及的伦理维度。所呈现的关于埃博拉流行病的两种类型媒体的调查提供了更全面地洞察这种多样性的可能性，作为伦理讨论的基础。结论 对埃博拉流行病的伦理讨论需要尽可能多地检查所涉及的伦理维度。所呈现的关于埃博拉流行病的两种类型媒体的调查提供了更全面地洞察这种多样性的可能性，作为伦理讨论的基础。