Are all lives equal? The question is intended to be thorny and the answer depends entirely on the philosophy addressed. The egalitarian approach says that yes, all are equal and that it is unfair that some are considered more important than others. Utilitarians, for their part, have no problem with the idea of sorting because not all things have the same value. Modern medicine plays a lot with these ethical questions.
Since the Napoleonic Wars where battle methods became increasingly violent, doctors have begun to think about the question of primacy. Dominique Larrey, among others, was one of the first to realize that it was necessary, for example, to carry out amputations as a priority because they were easier and less damaging in the long term than waiting before carrying them out. The Second World War saw Winston Churchill invite doctors to prioritize the use of penicillin on soldiers most likely to return to the front. Consequently, the antibiotic was more useful for those who contracted gonorrhea than for more seriously injured people.
From the first tests on dialysis to covid-19, the medical world has been faced with sometimes heartbreaking choices about which patients to treat. Thus, the organization Médecins sans Frontières goes to regions of the world to treat specific crises to the detriment of other therapeutic needs. It’s part of his reality.
The problem is not so much the sorting according to medical factors which erase socio-economic differences as the choices which accentuate them. For example, making a particular drug a “luxury” product when it doesn’t cost that much to produce. This sorting (conscious or not) of the pharmaceutical and medical world is much more problematic than that of patients.
Duration: 19min21
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