Scaricity of Healthcare Resources Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Scaricity of Healthcare Resources - Essay Example hilosophical biomedical ethical issues have developed in complexity as they are influenced by a number of factors including religion, law, anthropology and sociology. Each of the influencing factors is complex by themselves and this tends to make the biomedical ethical issues even more confusing for the healthcare service providers, especially as they are in the forefront in the use of the massive technological developments that have been in the recent past. The origins of the practical normative ethics of biomedical ethics goes back to the school of thought normally associated with Hippocrates and the famous Hippocratic oath. This oath sums up the school of thought on the ethical principles of curing and healing. The emphasis in the early days of medical history was on healing and not on curing, as the means of curing diseases was limited. Helping people to cope with diseases that had inflicted them had more relevance. The mode of intervention was left to the judgment of the physician. Thus the first principles of biomedical ethics of beneficence and nonmaleficence were laid. Even today there are many who believe that the goals of medicine remain in these complimentary factors of curing and healing. The subsequent history of bio-ethics is limited to interpretations of Galen in the second century and the opposing views expressed by Vesalius thirteen centuries later. However the next significant step in the development of biomedical ethics was seen in 1803, through the expressions of Thomas Percival, in his work Medical Ethics. Percival expanded the prevalent biomedical ethics of beneficence and nonmaleficence to incorporate the idea of the professional responsibility of physicians and their responsibility to society. Thus introducing the third principle in development of biomedical ethics in the form of justice. Further development in the principles of bioethics was seen in the 1960s and 1970s. Concern on the medical treatment procedures without proper