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Public Preferences About Fairness and the Ethics of Allocating Scarce Medical Interventions

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Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Fairness, Equity, and Justice

Abstract

This chapter examines the relationship between social-scientific research on public preferences regarding allocation and ethical inquiry into how resources should be allocated. It also explains how social-scientific researchers might find an understanding of work in ethics useful as they design mechanisms for data collection and analysis. I proceed by first distinguishing the methodologies used in ethics from those used in the social sciences. I then provide an overview of different approaches to the ethics of allocating scarce medical interventions, including an approach—the complete lives system—which I have previously defended, and a brief recap of social-scientific research on the allocation of scarce medical resources. Following these overviews, I examine different ways in which public preferences could matter to the ethics of allocation. Last, I suggest some ways in which social scientists could learn from ethics as they conduct research into public preferences regarding the allocation of scarce medical resources.

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Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Ezekiel Emanuel, Alan Wertheimer, and Timo Smieszek for discussion of these issues, and to Meng Li, David Tracer, and an anonymous reviewer for their comments. Thanks to Kristen Miller for her help with the references.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Berman Institute of Bioethics, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Govind Persad

  2. Department of Health Policy and Management, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Govind Persad

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  1. Govind Persad
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Correspondence to Govind Persad .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Health and Behavioral Sciences, University of Colorado Denver, Denver, Colorado, USA

    Meng Li

  2. Departments of Health and Behavioral Sciences and Anthropology, University of Colorado Denver, Denver, Colorado, USA

    David P. Tracer

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Persad, G. (2017). Public Preferences About Fairness and the Ethics of Allocating Scarce Medical Interventions. In: Li, M., Tracer, D. (eds) Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Fairness, Equity, and Justice. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-58993-0_4

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