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"Communitarian claims" as an ethical basis for allocating health care resources

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  • Mooney, Gavin

Abstract

This paper presents the case for re-examining the most commonly adopted basis of resource allocation in health care, i.e. need. The key problems identified with most needs approaches are (a) defining its precise meaning, (b) that the community is seldom consulted as to first what constitute needs for health care or second what relative weights are to be attached to health gains aimed at addressing different needs and (c) more generally, proceeding without knowing what the community wants the objectives of health care to be. It is suggested that John Broome's notion of "claims", especially what this paper calls "communitarian claims", may be helpful in providing a better basis for allocating health care resources. Such "communitarian claims" allow inter alia for the community to be involved in setting the social choice rules with respect to the governance of health care and for determining what it is that it (the community) wants from its health service. The links to rights are also identified and the advantages of communitarian claims over both a simple concept of need and rights are set out, without arguing that either needs (or rights) ought necessarily to be abandoned as bases for resource allocation in health care.

Suggested Citation

  • Mooney, Gavin, 1998. ""Communitarian claims" as an ethical basis for allocating health care resources," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 47(9), pages 1171-1180, November.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:47:y:1998:i:9:p:1171-1180
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Anand, Paul, 2003. "The integration of claims to health-care: a programming approach," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(5), pages 731-745, September.
    2. Philippe Batifoulier & John Latsis & Jacques Merchiers, 2010. "Les priorités de la prise en charge financière des soins. Une approche par la philosophie du besoin," EconomiX Working Papers 2010-2, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.
    3. Abellán Perpiñán, José Mª & Sánchez Martínez,Fernando I. & Martínez Pérez, Jorge E., 2007. "La medición del bienestar social relacionado con la salud/The Measurement of the Health Related Social Welfare," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 25, pages 927-950, Diciembre.
    4. Joanna Coast, 2001. "Citizens, their agents and health care rationing: an exploratory study using qualitative methods," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 10(2), pages 159-174, March.
    5. Nancy Devlin & Paul Hansen, 2000. "Allocating Vote: Health — ‘Needs Assessment’ and an Economics-Based Approach," Treasury Working Paper Series 00/04, New Zealand Treasury.
    6. Ruben Andreas Sakowsky, 2021. "Disentangling the welfarism/extra‐welfarism distinction: Towards a more fine‐grained categorization," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(9), pages 2307-2311, September.
    7. Mooney, Gavin, 2005. "Communitarian claims and community capabilities: furthering priority setting?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 247-255, January.
    8. Stephen Birch & Joy Melnikow & Miriam Kuppermann, 2003. "Conservative versus aggressive follow up of mildly abnormal Pap smears: Testing for process utility," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(10), pages 879-884, October.
    9. Thiede, Michael, 2005. "Information and access to health care: is there a role for trust?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(7), pages 1452-1462, October.
    10. John Bridges, 2006. "Lean Systems Approaches to Health Technology Assessment," PharmacoEconomics, Springer, vol. 24(2), pages 101-109, December.
    11. Benning, Tim M. & Dellaert, Benedict G.C., 2013. "Paying more for faster care? Individuals' attitude toward price-based priority access in health care," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 119-128.
    12. Coast, Joanna, 2018. "A history that goes hand in hand: Reflections on the development of health economics and the role played by Social Science & Medicine, 1967–2017," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 227-232.

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