Is healthcare a right or privilege?

Published

If it is a right, then we have some work to do. If a privelidge, you get what you can pay for, right? Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.

Specializes in CTICU.

No, I didn't. I think you just proved that your argument is illogical. The 99 yo can get treatment, that IS a basic right right. As to what the treatment is, that's a medical decision.

People have to buy food - does that mean eating is not a right?

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Pediatric Critical Care, Cardiac, EMS.

"If anyone will not work, neither let him eat."

Eating is not a right.

It is conditional upon you doing what needs to be done to earn your keep. Unless you think that food magically appears on your table from Heaven, or the Government.

None of which is germane to the discussion at hand.

You either understand what rights are, or you don't. Calling everything you want, or everything you think people ought to have a "right" dilutes the term, and makes the very concept of rights meaningless.

Demanding universal healthcare as a right infringes upon the rights of free exercise for those who provide healthcare. Therefore it cannot logically be an intrinsic right. It can be an ethical responsibility through the principle of beneficence and distributive justice.

Look at it this way - your right to free speech does not demand anything from me other than that I not make a law preventing you from speaking. I can even shout you down if I choose. Your right to swing your fist is near absolute - so long as you stop where someone else's face begins. Nobody has to do anything for you to have those rights - they only have to not do something.

Miranda rights were mentioned earlier - the expressed right is to representation; in other words, you have the right to seek someone to represent you. The state has chosen to accept, though distributive justice, the responsibility to provide representation to all - but that is not the expressed right. The right is simply that 'you have the right to an attorney' - to choose to have someone represent you. The monetary aspects are not mentioned in the expressed right. Again, it is a right to not have something done - not to be questioned without representation present - more than to have something. The actual case law derives directly from the 5th amendment protection against self-incrimination. In other words, the police may not question you aggressively or unfairly, and you have the right to protection against such treatment.

So again, nobody has a right to anything that someone else must provide to them. They can only have a right to have something not taken from them - and the difference is substantive.

The language is important, no matter how much you try to say it isn't.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Critical care, tele, Medical-Surgical.

I hope I'm wrong. I think I read that it is OK to let people starve.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Pediatric Critical Care, Cardiac, EMS.

Not even close to what was said.

What was said was there is no right, or entitlement, to food.

I do what I can to feed the hungry. I refuse to take food from my child's mouth to do so. I find it morally repugnant to consider demanding someone else feed the hungry at gunpoint.

I have a moral obligation to give out of my blessings so that others might be blessed. I have no right to demand that of anyone else, in fact, it is morally wrong for me to do so. I can say "You ought", or I can say "you might" - but I cannot say "You must."

It's not ok to let people starve. It's also not ok to tell other people "feed the hungry or else." Somewhere in between is sanity.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Psych , Peds ,Nicu.

"So again, nobody has a right to anything that someone else must provide to them. They can only have a right to have something not taken from them - and the difference is substantive". Catcolalex

I guess you can say logically then even the right to free speech is not a right , because there is a cost to it , As a nation we have defended the right to free speech , through the courts ,the use of the police and military forces , so I could argue that because it is costing me tax dollars to have this right , has to be provided / defended by somebody and is not inheratent , it is not a right per Catcolalex's arguement .

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Pediatric Critical Care, Cardiac, EMS.
"So again, nobody has a right to anything that someone else must provide to them. They can only have a right to have something not taken from them - and the difference is substantive". Catcolalex

I guess you can say logically then even the right to free speech is not a right , because there is a cost to it , As a nation we have defended the right to free speech , through the courts ,the use of the police and military forces , so I could argue that because it is costing me tax dollars to have this right , has to be provided / defended by somebody and is not inheratent , it is not a right per Catcolalex's arguement .

First, you are not quoting Catcolalex, you are quoting me.

Second, your argument is specious. All that must be done to protect your right to free speech, free assembly, freedom of movement, et cetera, is to ensure that no law is passed inhibiting that right. When is the last time tax dollars funded your freedom of speech? Of assembly? Please explain to me how any military action in the last 200 years since the United States Revolution ensured, protected, or guaranteed your right to free speech? Show me in the US budget where your tax money goes to protect your freedom of speech, or of assembly, or even your right to due process. You are not paying government to protect your rights - you are paying your government to fund what you think you are going to get in exchange for what rights they are going to take away. Governments cannot grant rights - they can only infringe upon them.

I will concede on part of your point however, in that there is a distinction between claim rights and liberty rights. Liberty rights - like free speech, require nothing from another for their exercise. Claim rights do require an obligation from another for their exercise, though this is in general a negative obligation - a requirement not to do something. A right to life, liberty, or property requires the negative obligation on others not to assault and murder, wrongly imprison, or steal.

To presume a right to healthcare, or a right to abortion, or a right to a decently functioning infrastructure, however, insists that a principal right of the individual - the right to dispose of the fruits of his labor as he sees fit - be infringed in order to support an entitlement for all. This is contrary to the principles of individual rights and of distributive justice.

Your right to free speech does not have to be provided by anyone. I don't know how this can be said any more clearly. You can stand on the street corner and say Obama is the Antichrist. You can stand on the street corner and say the Republicans/Democrats/Libertarians/Whoever are going to destroy the country. You can stand on the street corner and say that purple golf-ball sized hail will rain from the sky if we don't all buy those funny looking coiled light bulbs. And unless you threaten someone, block the roadway, or otherwise make a nuisance of yourself - you are free to do all of that and more. Unlike some countries in this world, the state will not come and haul you off to prison for your opinions, the state will not send a goon squad to beat you up or shoot you to shut you up, the worst that will happen is that a police officer may inform you that you are infringing on the rights of nearby business owners to conduct their business, and would you kindly move along.

So I am going to try one more time to make my point, and then you can construct all the straw men and ad hominem arguments you like.

By calling everything you think people ought to have a "right" you devalue the entire concept of rights to the point where they are meaningless. Rights fall into general categories: rights of security - the right to be protected against unlawful search and seizure, the right to not be forced to testify against one's self ... rights of equality - the right of all people in this country to be treated equally under the law and have the law applied equally to them . . . and rights of liberty, essentially our fundamental freedoms as defined by the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the Civil War Amendments that restored freedoms to some of those our nation had spend a century oppressing.

Those can be considered 'rights'. Everything else may well be an ethical duty, a moral obligation, or a reasonable expectation - but it simply is not a right and saying it is will not make it so.

And the word is inherent, which is a different word from intrinsic.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Government as a collective representative of the people has an affirmative responsibility to protect the positive rights of individuals as established by laws established through the legislative process.

There certainly are strong arguments that viewing health care as a human right is consistent with American political values. see:

In contrast, a human rights approach would focus on the underlying

purpose of the health care system. The core human rights demand is for outcomes

consistent with internationally-recognized standards—regardless of whether the health

system is private or public. Framing health care reform as a matter of right establishes a

mechanism for government accountability and encourages public participation in the

decisions that affect our lives and well-being.

...

Governments are obliged to enforce the human right to health fall in three distinct ways:

they must respect the right, they must protect the right, and they must fulfill the right.

Respect. A government itself must not to violate the right to health, as it would by

cutting funding for doctors working in underserved areas, for example.

Protect. A government is responsible for preventing third parties from violating the right

to health. Eviscerating environmental regulations arguably violates the right to health, as

does allowing price gouging by monopolistic pharmaceutical companies.

Fulfill. A government must ensure all citizens have access to basic health services.

http://www.nhchc.org/Advocacy/RighttoHealthinAmerica.pdf
Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Psych , Peds ,Nicu.

TDFImedicRN I apologise for misattributing your authorship of the quote , due to a combination of just awakening from sleep ( I had worked the previous night ) and the change of page , I lost track of your Avatar .

As to the rest of what you wrote , too tired to debate , but I think the difference of opinion boils down to whether you accept the ideas espoused by Jeremy Bentham who believed that legal rights were the essence of rights, he denied the existence of natural rights or whether you believe in Thomas Aquinas who believed that rights purported by positive law but not grounded in natural law were not properly rights at all, but only a facade or pretense of rights.

If you believe Bentham , you will believe governments grant right by codifying your ability to excercise a right .

If you believe Aquinas , then you will obviously see no part in goverments granting rights .

That debate although open to us , I will leave to greater minds , that like to argue such things , its beyond me .

As to the spending of tax dollars to defend rights it happens every time people of opposing views take to the streets , the law enforcement agencies , in order to maintain the peace keep them apart . How are they paid for ? , by our tax dollars !, If the disturbance to the peace escalates into a riot then , some level of military force may becomes necessary to quell the unrest again that is paid for by tax dollars .

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in SICU, CRNA.

HM2VikingRN, your article is from FDR's extra bill of rights that he was pushing...FDR was one of the biggest expanders of government there ever was. Most of his policies expanded the role of government, or were deemed unconstitutional. He wanted the right to a job, the right to healthcare, right to education etc. All being originated or given by the government. Again, the government is not the bestower of rights. God is. "certain unalienable rights, endowed by our Creator".

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in PICU, NICU, L&D, Public Health, Hospice.
HM2VikingRN, your article is from FDR's extra bill of rights that he was pushing...FDR was one of the biggest expanders of government there ever was. Most of his policies expanded the role of government, or were deemed unconstitutional. He wanted the right to a job, the right to healthcare, right to education etc. All being originated or given by the government. Again, the government is not the bestower of rights. God is. "certain unalienable rights, endowed by our Creator".

So is the logical question...

Does the fact that we have "certain unalienable rights" gifted from God necessarily mean that a society or government cannot or should not have other "rights" designated? Doesn't that phrase mean, really, that the government MAY NOT, under any circumstances, create law or ordinance which violates them. Just because God loves me already doesn't mean my government can't love me too.

Am I missing something here?

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Humankind reflects the will of god by establishing certain basic positive rights.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Ive gone through and read it twice. Perhaps I am "looking like a man" as my wife tells me quite frequently. But I cant seem to find the section in the constitution that says health care is a right. I also have failed to see the part that says when work has become an option for many that those who continue to do so should be out more to maintain the necessities and luxuries of those who have stopped and or chose not to.

Thanks

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion