September 16, 2025
In Making the Cut, EPPC Fellow Aaron Kheriaty, MD, shows what medicine can give us, but also what it can take away.
(Washington): Today, Ethics and Public Policy Center (EPPC) scholar and Director of the Bioethics, Technology and Human Flourishing Project, Dr. Aaron Kheriaty releases his new book, Making the Cut: How to Heal Modern Medicine.
Medicine is sick. One in three people now distrust our healthcare system. After the pandemic, two-thirds of Americans doubt medical scientists will act in the best interest of the public. Medicine seems powerless to grapple with the epidemic of chronic illness—heart disease, cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, stroke, and chronic lung and kidney disease—affecting six in ten Americans. The overall life expectancy of Americans has declined for the first time since the Great Depression.
Not only are trust levels tanking, but the number of doctors is also dropping dramatically. Physicians are quitting in droves. One in five doctors will leave medicine in the next two years. One in three will reduce their hours.
In Making the Cut, Dr. Aaron Kheriaty, one of the country’s leading public intellectuals and preeminent bioethicists, reveals what medicine gave him—and what it sometimes took from him. This book is about how he grew from an overconfident pre-med to an ambivalent medical student to a capable physician who had fallen in love with medicine—even if his lover has turned into a prostitute of late. While presenting a damning diagnosis of contemporary medicine, Making the Cut also applies the wounding scalpel in order to heal it.
“A modern classic. Making the Cut is a captivating memoir and profound meditation on what ails modern medicine—and how to heal it. It should be required reading for all doctors and medical students, and really for anyone who cares about the health of our nation and our nation’s health.”
—Ryan T. Anderson, PhD, President of the Ethics and Public Policy Center
The book has already received widespread praise:
“Essential reading for anyone interested in how to heal modern medicine.”
—Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University and former member of the President’s Council on Bioethics“Kheriaty demonstrates to readers he’s exactly what our health system needs more of—a doctor you can trust.”
—Mollie Hemingway, Editor in Chief of The Federalist
“How is the practice of medicine going to recover from the disaster of 2020 and following? To answer that question comes Dr. Aaron Kheriaty, one of the great heroes of the pandemic period..”
—Jeffrey Tucker, Founding President of the Brownstone Institute
“Both affectionate critique and pointed criticism from a self-professed reluctant romantic in love with flawed patients and his flawed profession, he looks at his profession as he would a patient and determines that it is sick indeed. This book is his prescription for a cure.”
—G. Kevin Donovan, MD, MA, Clinical Professor Emeritus and Director of the Center for Clinical Bioethics at Georgetown University
“A sophisticated, evidence-based proposal interwoven with and undergirded by Kheriaty’s own engrossing story. I cannot wait to use this book in the classroom.”
—Charles Camosy, bioethicist and author of Too Expensive to Treat?: Finitude, Tragedy, and the Neonatal ICU
“A luminous and unflinchingly candid memoir that traces the inner contours of medical formation with intellectual rigor and moral clarity..”
—Keri O. Brenner, MD, MPA, Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at Stanford University
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Media Inquiries:
Hunter Estes
Director of Communications
Ethics and Public Policy Center
[email protected]
