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Cause for coercion: cause for concern?

Maxwell J Smith¹

¹Western Research Chair in Public Health Ethics, Faculty of Health Sciences, Rotman Institute of Philosophy, Western University, London, ON, Canada. maxwell.smith@uwo.ca.

Monash Bioethics Review

|February 13, 2024

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Governments may ethically justify coercive public health measures, even if initially neglecting threats. Prior ethical objections to coercion do not automatically preclude its use in emergencies.

Keywords:

Coercion Necessity Public health Public health ethics

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Area of Science:

Public Health Ethics
Infectious Disease Control
Governmental Policy

Background:

Coercive public health measures are often employed reactively to infectious disease threats.
Richard Coker's work highlights the ethical issues arising from neglecting threats and resorting to coercion.

Purpose of the Study:

To examine whether ethically objectionable antecedents for coercion preclude its use.
To determine if neglected public health threats justify coercive measures.

Main Methods:

Ethical analysis of governmental responses to public health crises.
Argumentative review of existing literature on public health coercion.

Main Results:

Neglecting public health threats creates ethically problematic conditions for coercion.
The justification for coercive measures is not automatically invalidated by prior governmental neglect.

Conclusions:

Coercion in public health can be ethically permissible even when preceded by neglect.
Evaluation of governmental coercion requires careful consideration of context and necessity.