When good organs go to bad people.
A number of philosophers have argued that alcoholics should receive lower priority for liver transplantations because they are morally responsible for their medical conditions. In this paper, I argue that this conclusion is false. Moral responsibility should not be used as a criterion for the allocation of medical resources. The reason I advance goes further than the technical problem of assessing moral responsibility. The deeper problem is that using moral responsibility as an allocation criterion undermines the functioning of medicine.
Ho
Dien
D
School of Arts and Sciences, Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, Boston, MA 02115, USA. dien.ho@mcphs.edu
D026690:Ethics, Clinical; D015276:Health Care Rationing / Q000941:ethics*; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment; D008019:Life Style; D008108:Liver Diseases, Alcoholic / Q000150:complications / Q000601:surgery*; D016031:Liver Transplantation / Q000941:ethics*; D028681:Moral Obligations; D018579:Patient Selection / Q000941:ethics*; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations / Q000941:ethics; D012945:Social Values