Age-rationing in health care: flawed policy, personal virtue.
The age-rationing debate of fifteen years ago will inevitably reemerge as health care costs escalate. All age-rationing proposals should be judged in light of the current system of rationing health care by price in the U.S., and the resulting pattern of excess and deprivation. Age-rationing should be rejected as public policy, but recognized as a personal virtue of stewardship among the elderly.
Churchill
Larry R
LR
Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee 37232, USA. larry.churchill@vanderbilt.edu
D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D003363:Cost Control; D015276:Health Care Rationing / Q000191:economics / Q000941:ethics / Q000379:methods; D006297:Health Services Accessibility / Q000191:economics / Q000941:ethics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006299:Health Services for the Aged / Q000941:ethics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D007348:Insurance, Health