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COVID-19 and health-related authority allocation puzzles

COVID-19 and health-related authority allocation puzzles
COVID-19 and health-related authority allocation puzzles
COVID-19-related controversies concerning the allocation of scarce resources, travel restrictions, and physical distancing norms each raise a foundational question: How should authority, and thus responsibility, over healthcare and public health law and policy be allocated? Each controversy raises principles that support claims by traditional wielders of authority in “federal” countries, like federal and state governments, and less traditional entities, like cities and sub-state nations. No existing principle divides “healthcare and public law and policy” into units that can be allocated in intuitively compelling ways. This leads to puzzles concerning (a) the principles for justifiably allocating “powers” in these domains and (b) whether and how they change during “emergencies.” This work motivates the puzzles, explains why resolving them should be part of long-term responses to COVID-19, and outlines some initial COVID-19-related findings that shed light on justifiable authority allocation, emergencies, emergency powers, and the relationships between them.
Authority, COVID-19, Health Policy, Social Policy, Bioethics
0963-1801
25-36
Da Silva, Michael
05ad649f-8409-4012-8edc-88709b1a3182
Da Silva, Michael
05ad649f-8409-4012-8edc-88709b1a3182

Da Silva, Michael (2020) COVID-19 and health-related authority allocation puzzles. Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics, 30 (1), 25-36.

Record type: Article

Abstract

COVID-19-related controversies concerning the allocation of scarce resources, travel restrictions, and physical distancing norms each raise a foundational question: How should authority, and thus responsibility, over healthcare and public health law and policy be allocated? Each controversy raises principles that support claims by traditional wielders of authority in “federal” countries, like federal and state governments, and less traditional entities, like cities and sub-state nations. No existing principle divides “healthcare and public law and policy” into units that can be allocated in intuitively compelling ways. This leads to puzzles concerning (a) the principles for justifiably allocating “powers” in these domains and (b) whether and how they change during “emergencies.” This work motivates the puzzles, explains why resolving them should be part of long-term responses to COVID-19, and outlines some initial COVID-19-related findings that shed light on justifiable authority allocation, emergencies, emergency powers, and the relationships between them.

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Accepted/In Press date: 26 May 2020
Published date: 8 June 2020
Keywords: Authority, COVID-19, Health Policy, Social Policy, Bioethics

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 467948
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/467948
ISSN: 0963-1801
PURE UUID: 05a626bc-d434-4808-88d4-6e1f1a8e4b8f
ORCID for Michael Da Silva: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-7021-9847

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Date deposited: 26 Jul 2022 16:51
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 04:12

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Contributors

Author: Michael Da Silva ORCID iD

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