Age-rationing and the just distribution of health care: Is there a duty to die?
citation_date
1987-01
Description
The author analyzes the argument that a policy involving distributive justice in the allocation of scarce health care resources, based on the strategy of rational self interest maximation under a veil of ignorance (Rawls/Daniels), would result in an age rationing system of voluntary, socially encouraged, direct termination of the lives of the elderly rather than their medical abandonment. She maintains that such a policy would be a fair response only in a situation of substantial scarcity of resources that cannot be relieved without introducing greater injustices. Battin suggests that some of the current pressure on resources could be reduced by pruning waste and the expenses attributable to paternalistic imposition of treatment and to the practice of defensive medicine. She also advocates reconsideration of societal priorities assigned to various social goods.
Type
text;
citation_publisher
University of Chicago Press
citation_volume
97
citation_issue
2
citation_firstpage
317
Citation_lastpage
340
citation_keywords
Health care providers; Death; Euthanasia
Subject (MESH)
Aged; Delivery of Health Care; Ethics
citation_language
eng;
Bibliographic Citation
Battin, M.P. (1987). Age-rationing and the just distribution of health care: is there a duty to die? Ethics, 97(2), 317-40.
