Question Are there universal principles in healthcare, or is ethics in health care relativistic?

Accepted:
September 5, 2013

Comments

I presume you're asking a normative or conceptual question, rather than a descriptive question about how healthcare systems are in fact viewed or implemented in various places. I'd answer, then, that whether ethical principles are objective or relative, universal or particular, doesn't depend on the subject matter at hand.

If ethical principles depend on the place or culture (like rules of etiquette), then it seems they must be relative no matter whether they concern the ethics of healthcare or (say) the ethics of meat-eating. On the other hand, if ethical principles are true or false objectively (like statements in chemistry), then it seems they must be true or false objectively regardless of the subject matter. I can't see how there could be objective principles concerning the ethical permissibility of eating meat but only culturally relative principles concerning the ethical permissibility of aborting a fetus or euthanizing a patient.

This isn't to say that objective and universal principles of healthcare ethics can't take account of local conditions. Just for example, any society might be morally required to provide free dental care to its members if, but only if, the society has attained a particular level of wealth: that principle would be universal in that it would apply to all societies that fit a given description.

Question Are there universal principles in healthcare, or is ethics in health care relativistic? Accepted:September 5, 2013

Question Are there universal principles in healthcare, or is ethics in health care relativistic?

Accepted:
September 5, 2013