Nicholas Tonti-Filippini

Nicholas Tonti-Filippini
Lateran University, John Paul II institute, Italy

Biography

Professor Nicholas Tonti-Filippini MA (Monash) PhD (Melb) FHERDSA is Associate Dean (Teaching, Learning and Research) and Head of Bioethics at the John Paul II institute. The Institute is associated with the Lateran University in Rome and is accredited in Australia to conduct graduate programs (Grad Dip, Masters and PhD) in Theology and Bioethics. He is currently involved in several research projects.

He is a Bioethicist and currently chair of the National Health and Medical Research Council Working Committee on Commercialization of Human Tissue. He has strong interest in transplantation. He was also a member of thre NHMRC Committee on ART which produced guidelines for stem cell resesarch. He recently published an article on the death issue for the Journal of Bioethics. Nick has served on numerous government committees including the Australian Health Ethics Committee where he was a deputy chair and chaired committees on the unresponsive state and on the commercial use of human tissue. In 1982 he was Australias first hospital ethicist at St Vincents Hospital where he was Director of Bioethics. He has taught medical students, nurses and others for thirty years and after leaving St Vincent’s has been a consultant serving the Office of the Australian Prime Minister, the Australian Minister for Health, the US Congress, the Victorian Minister for Health, the German Federal Department of Health and Welfare, UNESCO and the Australian Catholic Bishops. In 2009 he was appointed a papal knight by Pope Benedict XVI for his work in Bioethics and for the Catholic Church.

Nick is chronically ill with renal disease and has been on dialysis for the past nineteen years. The latter led to coronary disease and he had some bad luck with a failed coronary bypass operation in 2004 after which he has had fifteen angioplasty procedures and the placement of eight stents. He is married to a GP, Dr Mary Walsh, and they have four children. The underlying disease has also caused vision disability and neuropathy which means that he now uses dictation software for much of his output. Despite that he has maintained his research active status and currently has five articles forthcoming in peer reviewed journals and is completing the co-authorship of a guide to current ethical issues.