Uences such as this are morally problematic, the libertarian perspective has some morally reasonable elements. More specifically, it may be the case that 100,000 targeted cancer drugs yielding gains in life expectancy measurable in weeks or months ought not to be socially funded as a requirement of justice but that ability to pay should determine access to that resource.J. Pers. Med. 2013,There are several other prominent conceptions of health care justice that require brief discussion. Each of them, I would argue, is morally reasonable in some respects but not morally reasonable if seen as the exclusive arbiter of just approaches to health care rationing or priority-setting. Thus, the utilitarian perspective on health care justice says that we ought to spend our limited resources in ways that will yield the greatest health good for the greatest number. If many of these targeted cancer therapies yield only marginal gains in length of life or quality of life, then that is neither a wise nor just use of limited social resources from a utilitarian perspective [40]. Unfortunately, health care needs are not distributed uniformly across the population or across the lifespan of individuals. Some individuals, such as patients with more serious forms of cystic fibrosis, will require a million dollars` worth of health care just to reach age twenty when they will die. Many egalitarians will want to argue that we are morally obligated, as a matter of justice and equal respect for all individuals, to meet the health care needs of those patients so long as we have effective medical technologies for them [41]. As long as these therapeutic technologies are effective, cost is morally irrelevant as well as the quality of life of these individuals and any commitment to maximize social welfare. That is, this example shows one respect in which the utilitarian perspective is morally inadequate. The defining feature of the egalitarian perspective on health care justice is equal concern and respect for all. Enzastaurin chemical information However, that abstract commitment generates a variety of versions of egalitarianism with very different practical outcomes. There is what is called strict egalitarianism. This is the view that whatever any one BMS-214662 solubility individual receives in access to needed health care is what every other individual with that same condition has a just claim to [41]. Again, there is an intuitive rightness and fairness about this abstract principle. But the critical question can be raised: Does that mean that an individual with advanced Alzheimer`s and late-stage heart failure would have as much a just claim to a 200,000 left ventricular assist device as a 55-year old individual with advanced heart failure and otherwise good health? An affirmative answer to this question would seem morally unreasonable, given enormous other unmet health care needs in society. Equally unreasonable, many would argue, would be denying this life-prolonging technology to the 55-year old. Still, John Harris, a strict egalitarian writes (p. 101): Each person`s desire to stay alive should be regarded as of the same importance and deserving the same respect as that of anyone else, irrespective of the quality of their life or its expected duration [42]. This has obvious relevance to how access to these very expensive targeted therapies ought to be determined. There are moderate forms of egalitarianism. But the critical question remains: What should be equal? Should resources [43] or outcomes [44] or opportun.Uences such as this are morally problematic, the libertarian perspective has some morally reasonable elements. More specifically, it may be the case that 100,000 targeted cancer drugs yielding gains in life expectancy measurable in weeks or months ought not to be socially funded as a requirement of justice but that ability to pay should determine access to that resource.J. Pers. Med. 2013,There are several other prominent conceptions of health care justice that require brief discussion. Each of them, I would argue, is morally reasonable in some respects but not morally reasonable if seen as the exclusive arbiter of just approaches to health care rationing or priority-setting. Thus, the utilitarian perspective on health care justice says that we ought to spend our limited resources in ways that will yield the greatest health good for the greatest number. If many of these targeted cancer therapies yield only marginal gains in length of life or quality of life, then that is neither a wise nor just use of limited social resources from a utilitarian perspective [40]. Unfortunately, health care needs are not distributed uniformly across the population or across the lifespan of individuals. Some individuals, such as patients with more serious forms of cystic fibrosis, will require a million dollars` worth of health care just to reach age twenty when they will die. Many egalitarians will want to argue that we are morally obligated, as a matter of justice and equal respect for all individuals, to meet the health care needs of those patients so long as we have effective medical technologies for them [41]. As long as these therapeutic technologies are effective, cost is morally irrelevant as well as the quality of life of these individuals and any commitment to maximize social welfare. That is, this example shows one respect in which the utilitarian perspective is morally inadequate. The defining feature of the egalitarian perspective on health care justice is equal concern and respect for all. However, that abstract commitment generates a variety of versions of egalitarianism with very different practical outcomes. There is what is called strict egalitarianism. This is the view that whatever any one individual receives in access to needed health care is what every other individual with that same condition has a just claim to [41]. Again, there is an intuitive rightness and fairness about this abstract principle. But the critical question can be raised: Does that mean that an individual with advanced Alzheimer`s and late-stage heart failure would have as much a just claim to a 200,000 left ventricular assist device as a 55-year old individual with advanced heart failure and otherwise good health? An affirmative answer to this question would seem morally unreasonable, given enormous other unmet health care needs in society. Equally unreasonable, many would argue, would be denying this life-prolonging technology to the 55-year old. Still, John Harris, a strict egalitarian writes (p. 101): Each person`s desire to stay alive should be regarded as of the same importance and deserving the same respect as that of anyone else, irrespective of the quality of their life or its expected duration [42]. This has obvious relevance to how access to these very expensive targeted therapies ought to be determined. There are moderate forms of egalitarianism. But the critical question remains: What should be equal? Should resources [43] or outcomes [44] or opportun.
