Welfare Reform on the Web (January 2005): Healthcare - Overseas

CONCERNS FOR THE WORSE OFF: FAIR INNINGS VERSUS SEVERITY

E. Nord

Social Science and Medicine, vol.60, 2005, p.257-263

Paper compares the "fair innings" approach to healthcare prioritisation to a "severity of condition" approach. One of the key issues that emerges is the extent to which past suffering should be taken into account in determining a person's entitlement to healthcare.

COMMUNITARIAN CLAIMS AND COMMUNITY CAPACITY: FURTHERING PRIORITY SETTING?

G. Mooney

Social Science and Medicine, vol.60, 2005, p.247-255

Paper draws on ideas from Sen and Nussbaum and adds some communitarian underpinnings to provide a way of improving the use of programme budgeting and marginal analysis (PBMA) in priority setting. Suggests that moving to a communitarian base for priority setting alters the distribution of property rights over health service decision making and increases the probability that recommendations from PBMA exercises will be implemented. Methods for eliciting community views and values are suggested.

A "FAIR INNINGS" BETWEEN THE SEXES: ARE MEN BEING TREATED INEQUITABLY?

A. Tsuchiya and A. Williams

Social Science and Medicine, vol.60, 2005, p.277-286

In most developed countries, women live longer than men. Paper addresses the question of whether the fair innings approach to healthcare resource allocation therefore justifies discrimination in favour of men. The authors do not support this conclusion, but propose that the concept of a "fair innings" should include overall well-being. Thus a person who had experienced multiple deprivation in many domains of life would have a greater claim to healthcare.