Chapter 6 Suggested Readings and Media Resouces

James F. Childress, Who Should Decide?: Paternalism in Health Care (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982). (Paternalism)

Liam B. Murphy, “The Demands of Beneficence,” Philosophy and Public Affairs 22 (1993): 267–92. (Beneficence)

Peter Singer, “Famine, Affluence, and Morality,” Philosophy and Public Affairs 1 (1972): 229–43. (Beneficence)

Ronald Bayer and Jennifer Stuber, “Tobacco Control, Stigma, and Public Health: Rethinking the Relations,” American Journal of Public Health 96 (January 2006): 27–50. (Paternalistic public policy; Stigma)

James Rachels, “Barney Clark’s Key,” Hastings Center Report 13 (April 1983): 17–19. (Ambiguity in term suicide)

Uwe R. Reinhardt, “‘Cost-Effectiveness Analysis’ and U.S. Health Care,” The New York Times, March 13, 2009.

Documentary Video: Discussions in Bioethics: “Courage of One’s Convictions?”
This video presents a dramatization of a case involving a teenaged girl who refuses a blood transfusion because of her beliefs as a Jehovah’s Witness. It presents the class with an example of a situation of a conflict between physician beneficence and patient autonomy (i.e., paternalism).