- Utilitarian bioethics
Utilitarian Bioethics is a branch of
utilitarian ethics andbioethics that recommends directing medical resources where they will have most long-term effect for good.It is implicitly used in some healthcare planning decisions, such as the use of
Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALYs) and the concept oftriage , but is controversial in many other cases.Economic argument
Utilitarian bioethics is based on the premise that the distribution of resources is a
zero-sum game, and that it therefore medical decisions should logically be made on the basis of each person's total future productive value and happiness, their chance of survival from the present, and the resources required for treatment.For those whose cost of medical treatment or maintenance outweighs their total future economic value (because they are terminally ill, are no longer productive, and have no reasonable chance of becoming productive or happy in the foreseeable future), it is economically efficient to free up medical resources by not treating them.
As an example of this logic, every nurse who cares for a terminally ill Alzheimer's or cancer patient, a comatose individual, or an individual in a vegetative state, is one less nurse to take care of a sick baby or a 12-year-old gunshot victim. See
opportunity cost .Therefore, the benefits Utilitarian Bioethics include increased medical expenditure on other patients with a higher chance of survival and return to a productive and/or happy status. This would ideally lead to an overall net increase in wealth and happiness.
The perceived downsides of Utilitarian Bioethics include : potential justifications for physicians to kill patients, a gravitation towards acceptance of mortality and death, lack of medical progress (as the treatment of severe injuries would not be explored), the uncertainty in measuring 'happiness', and the possibility of classification of many disabled or old people as "
nonperson s".ee also
*
Futile medical care
*Medical ethics
*Baby K
*Cost-utility analysis Further reading
"In favor of forms of Utilitarian Bioethics:"
*Peter Singer , "Practical Ethics", Cambridge Univ Pr (Pap Txt); ISBN 0-521-43971-X; 2nd edition (February 1993)
* [http://sunsite.wits.ac.za/bio/intro1.htm Udo Schüklenk, 2001]"Against:"
* [http://www.tell-us-your-story.com/_disc69r/0000000d.htm Betty Alfred, 1999 ]
*Dean R. Koontz , "One Door Away from Heaven ", Bantam Books; ISBN 0-553-58275-5; (October, 2002)
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
