Health and Justice

Many questions about the design and evaluation of our health care system concern basic issues of justice.  The United States is alone among advanced developed societies in not ensuring that everyone has access to health care.  Is that a violation of justice?  More importantly, perhaps, why is it unjust (if it is)?  On the other hand, and somewhat ironically, the United States is also the society with the most concerted opposition to the idea that health care should be rationed.  Identifying the grounds on which, and the procedures by which, health care should be rationed is one of the most vexed questions at the intersection of justice and health policy.

Select books and articles by Trent Center faculty working in the area of health and justice include:

Gopal Sreenivasan

            “Health care and human rights,” Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics (2016) 37: 343-64.

Phil Rosoff

            Rationing is not a Four-Letter Word (MIT, 2014).

Peter Ubel

            Pricing Life (MIT, 2000).

See more information about Trent Center faculty whose research focuses on bioethics.