Public Health Emergencies - The Ethics of Healthcare Provision

As evinced by government and public reactions to the recent H1N1 "swine" flu pandemic, public health emergencies expose some key ethical issues in public healthcare provision. Are there any ethical problems with "fast tracking" a vaccine? What if there is not enough to go around? Which individuals are to be given priority for inoculation? Are persons with financial means permitted to "jump the queue"? To what extent will we permit individuals to exercise their right to refuse vaccination, when by doing so they put other individuals at risk? Quebec, for example, has extremely aggressive emergency inoculation legislation. Will other provinces follow suit, or will Quebec's courts strike the legislation down? And, as always, what will be the effect of the Charter? It is my goal to articulate, in an accessible manner, possible solutions to these problems based upon various ethical models.