Ethics Ignored in Flu Planning

From a Financial Times article, Ethics being ignored in flu planning :

‘Ethics being ignored in flu planning’ [/] By Andrew Jack in London [/] Published: November 28 2005 19:59

Governments should explicitly address the ethics of how best to distribute medicines, support doctors and handle quarantine as they draw up contingency plans for a future flu pandemic, a group of Canadian researchers said on Monday.

In a report, the University of Toronto joint centre for bioethics pandemic influenza working group warns of the dangers when so few government pandemic plans contain any explicit ethical framework. Only the state of Ontario’s plan currently makes such a reference.

Based on the Canadian experience with Sars, Peter Singer, head of the centre and one of the authors, said: “In the first week, all the discussion was on technical issues such as the size of face masks, but by the second, the ethical issues were emerging. The foundation of the decisions of political, public health and healthcare leaders is not in operational details but ethics.”

The report recommends that health professionals be offered disability plans and death benefits for their families in the event that they contract the flu, in recompense for their duty of care to sick patients.

It calls for a public debate on the rationale for giving priority access to vaccines and antiviral drugs to particular groups, such as frontline health workers.

It says curbs on individual liberty such as quarantine should be based on proportionality and use the least restrictive means possible.

It also calls for the World Health Organisation to be sensitive, transparent and equitable in any recommendations on curbing travel to affected countries. [My ellipses and emphasis]