From 2006 to 2008, she worked as a research associate at the Institute for Ethics, History and Theory of Medicine at the University of Münster. In 2008/09, she was an academic scholar at the Harvard University Program in Ethics and Health at Harvard Medical School. From 2009 to 2012, she served as assistant director of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics in London.
She completed her habilitation in Münster in 2013, receiving the venia legendi (teaching qualification) in ethics, history and theory of medicine. From 2012 to 2014, she headed the DFG-Emmy Noether Group "Bioethics and Political Philosophy" at the University of Münster and was a senior research fellow in Public Policy at University College London until 2015.
In 2014, the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel appointed Buyx as Professor of Medical Ethics. She simultaneously served as co-director of the Institute for Experimental Medicine at the University of Kiel. In 2016, she was appointed as a member of the German Ethics Council and became its chair in 2020.
Buyx is committed to science communication and public engagement. Since August 2025, she has been co-moderator (alternating with journalist Stephanie Rohde) of the science discussion program "Nano Talk" on 3sat, the successor format to the interdisciplinary discussion program "Scobel". In 2025, her book Leben und Sterben: Die großen Fragen ethisch entscheiden (Life and Death: Making Ethical Decisions on the Big Questions) became a Spiegel bestseller.
She regularly gives public lectures on various medical ethics topics and appears in television and other media. She is committed to communicating with the public and making ethical considerations accessible to a broad audience.
Reception
As Chair of the German Ethics Council from 2020 to 2024, Buyx played a prominent role during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Ethics Council issued several statements and recommendations on ethical aspects of pandemic management, including on vaccination priorities, solidarity and responsibility, and the protection of vulnerable groups. During this time, she also served on the Federal Government's Corona Expert Council from December 2021 to April 2023.
Personal life
Buyx is married to Austrian entrepreneur Josef Lentsch, CEO of the Political Tech Summit, and has two sons.
Buyx, A. (2025). Leben und Sterben: Die großen Fragen ethisch entscheiden. S. Fischer Verlag. (Spiegel Bestseller)
Prainsack, B., & Buyx, A. (2017). Solidarity in Biomedicine and Beyond. Cambridge University Press.
Prainsack, B., & Buyx, A. (2016). Das Solidaritätsprinzip: Plädoyer für eine Renaissance in Medizin und Bioethik. Campus Verlag.
Prainsack, B., & Buyx, A. (2011). Solidarity: Reflections on an Emerging Concept in Bioethics. Nuffield Council on Bioethics.
Selected Journal Articles
Willem, T., Fritzsche, M.C., Zimmermann, B.M., et al., & Buyx, A. (2024). Embedded Ethics in Practice: A Toolbox for Integrating the Analysis of Ethical and Social Issues into Healthcare AI Research. Science and Engineering Ethics, 31(1):3.
Lekadir, K., Frangi, A.F., Porras, A.R., et al., & Buyx, A. (2024). FUTURE-AI: International Consensus Guideline for Trustworthy and Deployable Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare. British Medical Journal, 388:e081554.
Bak, M., Madai, V.I., Celi, L.A., et al., & Buyx, A. (2024). Federated Learning is Not a Cure-all for Data Ethics. Nature Machine Intelligence.
Fiske, A., McLennan, S., & Buyx, A. (2022). Ethical Insights from the COVID-19 Pandemic in Germany. The Lancet Regional Health Europe, 9:100213.
McLennan, S., Fiske, A., Tigard, D., Müller, R., Haddadin, S., & Buyx, A. (2022). Embedded Ethics: A Proposal for Integrating Ethics into the Development of Medical AI. BMC Medical Ethics, 23:6.
Meier, L.J., Hein, A., Diepold, K., & Buyx, A. (2022). Algorithms for Ethical Decision-Making in the Clinic: A Proof of Concept. The American Journal of Bioethics, 22(7):4–20.
McLennan, S., Fiske, A., Celi, L., Müller, R., Harder, J., Ritt, K., Haddadin, S., & Buyx, A. (2020). Embedded Ethics: A Proposal for Integrating Ethics into the Development of Healthcare AI. Nature Machine Intelligence, 2:488–490.
Fiske, A., Henningsen, P., & Buyx, A. (2019). Your Robot Therapist Will See You Now: Ethical Implications of Embodied Artificial Intelligence in Psychiatry, Psychology, and Psychotherapy. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 21(5):e13216.
Sierawska, A., & Buyx, A. (2019). Unmet Needs in Children with ADHD – Can tDCS Fill the Gap? Promises and Ethical Challenges. Frontiers in Psychiatry. doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00334.
Richter, G., Borzikowsky, C., Lieb, W., Schreiber, S., Krawczak, M., & Buyx, A. (2019). Patient Views on Research Use of Clinical Data Without Consent: Legal, but Also Acceptable? European Journal of Human Genetics. doi:10.1038/s41431-019-0340-6.
Prainsack, B., & Buyx, A. (2018). The Value of Work and Labour: Addressing the Future of Work Through the Lens of Solidarity. Bioethics, 32(9):585–592.
Fiske, A., Buyx, A., & Prainsack, B. (2018). Health Information Counselors: A New Profession for the Age of Big Data? Academic Medicine. doi:10.1097/ACM.0000000000002395.
Richter, G., Krawczak, M., Lieb, W., Wolff, L., Schreiber, S., & Buyx, A. (2018). Broad Consent for Healthcare-Embedded Biobanking: Understanding and Reasons to Donate in a Large Patient Sample. Genetics in Medicine, 20(1):76–82.
Littmann, J., Rid, A., & Buyx, A. (2018). Tackling Antimicrobial Resistance: Ethical Framework for Rational Antibiotic Use. European Journal of Public Health, 28(2):359–363.
Prainsack, B., & Buyx, A. (2012). Solidarity in Contemporary Bioethics – Towards a New Approach. Bioethics, 26(7):343–350.
↑Design, Universität Münster, Universität Münster, Web und. "Medizinische Fakultät Universität Münster". www.medizin.uni-muenster.de (in German). Retrieved 2026-04-27.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
