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Utilitarian Bioethics

Utilitarian Bioethics. What is it?. Recommends directing medical resources where they will do the most long-term effect for good Decisions are made based upon an individual’s future productive potential (& happiness) Productivity must supersede expenditure Value is a zero-sum game

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Utilitarian Bioethics

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  1. Utilitarian Bioethics

  2. What is it? • Recommends directing medical resources where they will do the most long-term effect for good • Decisions are made based upon an individual’s future productive potential (& happiness) • Productivity must supersede expenditure • Value is a zero-sum game • $100 example

  3. To exemplify: • Nurse or doctor caring for an Alzheimer’s / or terminal patient is “wasting” resources • No chance for productive/happy life • Better spent caring for a sick baby or 20-year-old gunshot victim • Again, productivity is the measuring stick

  4. Benefits • Resources are spent where they can be most beneficial to society (as a whole) • Overall increase in productivity and happiness • Less taxing on limited resources

  5. Potential downsides: • What is “happiness”? • Doctors play God • Bigotry against the “feeble” • Retarded, handicapped, generally sick • Lack of scientific progress • Why explore cures for cancer?

  6. Futile medical care: • Where there is no hope, there should be no course of treatment • Different from euthanasia • Does not hasten, speed or encourage death • Laws are currently being explored: Futile Care Law (Texas)

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