Rawlsian justice and palliative care

Knight, C. and Albertsen, A. (2015) Rawlsian justice and palliative care. Bioethics, 29(8), pp. 536-542. (doi: 10.1111/bioe.12156) (PMID:25689627)

Abstract

Palliative care serves both as an integrated part of treatment and as a last effort to care for those we cannot cure. The extent to which palliative care should be provided and our reasons for doing so have been curiously overlooked in the debate about distributive justice in health and healthcare. We argue that one prominent approach, the Rawlsian approach developed by Norman Daniels, is unable to provide such reasons and such care. This is because of a central feature in Daniels' account, namely that care should be provided to restore people's opportunities. Daniels' view is both unable to provide pain relief to those who need it as a supplement to treatment and, without justice-based reasons to provide palliative care to those whose opportunities cannot be restored. We conclude that this makes Daniels' framework much less attractive.

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Rawlsian Justice and Palliative Care, 17 Feb 2015, which has been published in final form at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bioe.12156/. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Knight, Dr Carl and Albertsen, Mr Andreas
• Authors: Knight, C., and Albertsen, A.
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Social and Political Sciences > Politics
• Journal Name: Bioethics
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
• ISSN: 0269-9702
• ISSN (Online): 1467-8519
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
• First Published: First published in Bioethics 29(8):536-542
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher