For most of us, the COVID-19 pandemic was one that we would not choose to relive. Unfortunately, epidemics on an international stage occur with relative frequency, every decade or so. While how to avoid major outbreaks is an important target, so is learning social lessons from COVID so as not to repeat them in the future. In this academic primer, Iwao Hirose seeks to distill such ethical lessons into a short, digestible format so that we can make healthier, wiser decisions more quickly in coming years. This book is especially suited towards those in health policy as students, teachers, experts, or administrators.
Hirose begins by dissecting that people approach pandemics through different ethical lenses, which can be philosophically categorized. Therefore, he proposes adopting certain proposals only when they form a “common ground” between multiple philosophical schools. He then applies this rubric on dominant issues of this prior pandemic: rationing healthcare resources, social and global inequities, restrictions on individual liberty, and how to nudge individuals towards voluntarily complying with healthy practices.
As an academic treatise, this work is not geared towards a popular audience. As such, it reads like a philosophy or ethics book. It’s not totally dry in that it discusses interesting, controversial issues of immense social impact. Though many in the general population are “over” the pandemic, its lessons are still being carefully digested by those who, like me, work in the healthcare arena. With a little bit of charisma, this book could be livened up for a popular audience, but its rightful place sits in places where learning is valued.
Students will serve as this book’s primary audience, I suspect, but those in the sectors of governmental policy and healthcare leadership should pay heed, too. This book helps readers think through popular responses to different policies, including how to anticipate counterarguments that will be made against decisions. The first step to foresight, after all, is clear hindsight. Pandemic specialists, who I suspect will have decent support for 10-20 years hence, can also benefit from this short read. It cements social and ethical frameworks in place so that the lessons of COVID19 will not be forgotten by the global healthcare system.
The Ethics of Pandemics: An Introduction
By Iwao Hirose
Copyright (c) 2023
Routledge
ISBN13 9781032067650
Page Count: 144
Genre: Philosophy, Healthcare
Sponsored Link to www.amazon.com