Death, Sex and Space

NASA is planning to explore other planets farther out in our solar system that will add even more years to the space missions resulting in the astronauts being away from home longer. The space agency has now been put in the position of pondering many issues that comes with long-term space travel. For example, what will the astronauts do with the body of an astronaut that has passed away during the mission? If an astronaut becomes critically ill and needs to be on life support, who makes the decision to take them off of life support?

Space travel will be heading to Mars in the next 30 years and doctors and scientists alike from NASA will be addressed with these issues over the next several years. These are indeed uncomfortable issues however they are being decided to build an ethical framework to give commanders and mission managers something to go by should the need arise.

One topic that has been very hot and taboo is how to cope with sexual desire among astronauts when on missions for that length of time? NASA has dodged the answer to this question for many years however this is another issue that will be addressed by NASA officials.

Paul Root Wolpe a bioethicist at the University Of Pennsylvania and has been an advisor to NASA since 2001 says, "There is a decision that is going to have to be made about mixed sex crews, and there is going to be a lot of debate about it."

There are some health issues that have been answered such as how much radiation astronauts should be exposed to (the amount equal to raising the astronaut's risk of cancer by 3% over their career) and how many hours a week does each astronaut work (48 hours).

There are some health issues that have been answered such as how much radiation astronauts should be exposed to and how many hours a week does each astronaut work?

Credit: www.virtualbay.co.nz

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