Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T08:24:35.484Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

8 - International health inequalities and global justice: toward a middle ground

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 March 2011

By
Norman Daniels
Edited by
Solomon Benatar  and
Gillian Brock
Solomon Benatar
Affiliation:
University of Cape Town
Gillian Brock
Affiliation:
University of Auckland
Get access

Summary

Disturbing international inequalities in health abound. Life expectancy in Swaziland is half that in Japan. A child unfortunate enough to be born in Angola has 73 times as great a chance of dying before age 5 as a child born in Norway. A mother giving birth in southern sub-Saharan Africa has 100 times as great a chance of dying from her labor as one birthing in an industrialized country. For every mile one travels outward toward the Maryland suburbs from downtown Washington, DC on its underground rail system, life expectancy rises by a year – reflecting the race and class inequities in American health. Are the glaring, even larger, international health inequalities also unjust?

All of us no doubt think they are grossly unfortunate. Many of us think they are unfair or unjust. Why should some people be at such a health disadvantage through no fault of their own, losers in a natural and social lottery assigning them birth in an unhealthy place? Others of us are troubled by the absence of the kinds of human relationships that ordinarily give rise to the claims of egalitarian justice that we make on each other – for example, being fellow citizens or even interacting in a cooperative scheme. Who has obligations of justice to reduce these international inequalities? And do those obligations hold regardless of how the inequalities came about? What institutions are accountable for addressing them?

Type
Chapter
Information
Global Health and Global Health Ethics , pp. 97 - 107
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Beitz, C. R. (1979). Political Theory and International Relations. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Beitz, C. R. (2000). Rawls's law of peoples. Ethics 110, 669–696.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, L. & Hanvoravongchai, P. (2005). HIV/AIDS and human resources. Bulletin of the World Health Organiztion 83, 143–144.Google Scholar
Cohen, J. & Sabel, C. (2006). Extra rempublicam nulla justitia. Philosophy and Public Affairs 34, 147–175.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Daniels, N. (2008). Just Health: Meeting Health Needs Fairly. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Deeming, C. (2004). Policy targets and ethical tensions: UK nurse recruitment. Social Policy and Administration 38 (7), 227–292.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liese, B., Blanchet, N. & Dussault, G. (2004). The human resource crisis in health services in Sub-Saharan Africa. Background Paper: World Development Report 2004, Making Services Work for Poor People. Washington, DC: The World Bank.Google Scholar
Nagel, T. (2005). The problem of global justice. Philosophy and Public Affairs 33, 113–147.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pogge, T. W. (2002). World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms. Oxford:Blackwell.Google Scholar
Pogge, T. W. (2005a). Human rights and global health: A research program. Metaphilosophy 36, 182–209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pogge, T. W. (2005b). Severe poverty as a violation of negative duties. Ethics and International Affairs 19, 55–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rawls, J. (1999). The Laws of Peoples. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
,UNICEF (2000). The State of the World's Children. www.unicef.org/sowcoo/stat2.htm (Accessed August 23, 2005).
,World Health Organization (WHO) (2004). Recruitment of Health Workers from the Developing World. Geneva: World Health Organization.Google Scholar
,World Health Organization/UNICEF/UNFPA (2005). Maternal Mortality in 2004 – Estimates Developed by WHO, UNICEF, and UNFPA. www.childinfo.org/Areas/maternalmortality (Accessed August 23, 2005).

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×