Vaccine Rationing and the Urgency of Social Justice in the Covid‐19 Response. Issue 3 (28th May 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Schmidt, Harald
• Is Part Of: Hastings Center report. Volume 50:Issue 3(2020)
• Page Start: 46
• Page End: 49
• Publication Date: 2020-05-28
• Subjects: vaccine rationing -- Covid‐19 -- social justice -- public health policies -- health disparities -- public health ethics; Medical ethics -- Periodicals; Bioethics -- Periodicals; 174.205
• DOI: 10.1002/hast.1113
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0093-0334

Abstract

Abstract: The Covid‐19 pandemic needs to be considered from two perspectives simultaneously. First, there are questions about which policies are most effective and fair in the here and now, as the pandemic unfolds. These polices concern, for example, who should receive priority in being tested, how to implement contact tracing, or how to decide who should get ventilators or vaccines when not all can. Second, it is imperative to anticipate the medium‐ and longer‐term consequences that these policies have. The case of vaccine rationing is particularly instructive. Ethical, epidemiological, and economic reasons demand that rationing approaches give priority to groups who have been structurally and historically disadvantaged, even if this means that overall life years gained may be lower .