Allocating Scarce Medical Resources and the Availability of Organ Transplantation

Abstract

The ProblemSome: controversies have a staying power because they spring from unavoidable moral and conceptual puzzles. The debates concerning transplantation are a good example. To begin with, they are not a single controversy. Rather, they are examples of the scientific debates with heavy political and ethical overlays that characterize a large area of public-policy discussions.¹ The determination of whether or not heart or liver transplantation is an experimental or noncxperimental procedure for which it is reasonable and necessary to provide reimbursement is not simply a determination on the basis of facts regarding survival rates or the frequency with which . . .