Rescuing the Duty to Rescue

Journal of Medical Ethics:1-5 (2014)
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Abstract

Clinicians and health researchers frequently encounter opportunities to rescue people. Rescue cases can generate a moral duty to aid those in peril. As such, bioethicists have leveraged a duty to rescue for a variety of purposes. Yet, despite its broad application, the duty to rescue is under-analyzed. In this paper, we assess the state of theorizing about the duty to rescue. There are large gaps in bioethicists’ understanding of the force, scope, and justification of the two most cited duties to rescue—the individual duty of easy rescue and the institutional rule of rescue. We argue that the duty of easy rescue faces unresolved challenges regarding its force and scope, and the rule of rescue is indefensible. If the duty to rescue is to help solve ethical problems, these theoretical gaps must be addressed. We identify two further conceptions of the duty to rescue that have received less attention—an institutional duty of easy rescue and the professional duty to rescue. Both provide guidance in addressing force and scope concerns and, thereby, traction in answering the outstanding problems with the duty to rescue. We conclude by proposing and propose research priorities for developing accounts of duties to rescue in bioethics

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Author Profiles

Tina Rulli
University of California, Davis
Joseph Millum
University of St. Andrews

References found in this work

Principles of biomedical ethics.Tom L. Beauchamp - 1979 - New York: Oxford University Press. Edited by James F. Childress.
Famine, Affluence, and Morality.Peter Singer - 1972 - Oxford University Press USA.
Moral demands in nonideal theory.Liam B. Murphy - 2000 - New York: Oxford University Press.
The moral limits of the criminal law.Joel Feinberg - 1984 - New York: Oxford University Press.
The Moral Demands of Affluence.Garrett Cullity - 2004 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press on Demand.

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