China: Bioethics, Trust, and the Challenge of the Market (Philosophy and Medicine, 96) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 9048177146 ISBN 13: 9789048177141

Publisher: Springer, 2010

Synopsis

to the Moral Challenges H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr. and Aaron E. Hinkley 1 Taking Finitude Seriously in a Chinese Cultural Context Across the world, health care policy is a moral and political challenge. Few want to die young or to suffer, yet not all the money in the world can deliver physical immortality or a life free of suffering. In addition, health care needs differ. As a result, unless a state coercively forbids those with the desire and means to buy better basic health care to do so, access to medicine will be unequal. No co- try can afford to provide all with the best of care. In countries such as China, there are in addition stark regional differences in the quality and availability of health care, posing additional challenges to public policy-making. Further, in China as elsewhere, the desire to lower morbidity and mortality risks has led to ever more resources being invested in health care. When such investment is supported primarily by funds derived from taxation, an increasing burden is placed on a country’s economy. This is particularly the case as in China with its one-child policy, where the proportion of the elderly population consuming health care is rising. Thesepolicychallengesarecompoundedbymoraldiversity. Defacto,humansdo not share one morality. Instead, they rank cardinal human goods and right-making conditions in different orders, often not sharing an af?rmation of the same goods or views of the right.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

This volume provides a unique perspective on the market reforms currently taking place in Chinese health care. The authors come to grips with the changes taking place in Chinese health care and its effect on the traditional doctor-patient relationship, but also its positive effects on the availability and quality of health care particularly in urban areas. In doing so the various authors wrestle with moral, political and social issues deeply ingrained in Chinese culture as well as the perceived practical and moral difficulties associated with the change to a market oriented economy especially in area of health care. This volume should be of particular interest to bioethicists, those interested in contemporary Chinese philosophy, and of course those working in health care policy, Chinese policy, comparative health care policy, or any combination thereof.

About this edition

• Publisher: Springer
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 9048177146
• ISBN 13: 9789048177141
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224
• Editor: Tao Lai Po-wah J.