Vaccination can be considered as one of the symbols that represent humanity’s success in global public healthcare. Nevertheless, as with other medical practices, there are many ethical concerns that are associated with vaccine allocations. The main challenges arise from the need to overcome the conflict between the interests of the individual and the health of society. Moreover, respect for individual autonomy should also be taken into account, as well as the right of a patient to make a voluntary choice. Other issues include the necessity to fairly distribute the vaccine among population while taking into consideration all benefits, risks, and social factors, for instance, the age of a patient. Situations that require doctors to apply the above universal ethical principles arise throughout the entire vaccination process, from its development until allocation.
For instance, it may seem evident that while distributing medical resources, those who are at risk the most should be targeted. However, this approach creates a number of issues; for example, researchers note that it is difficult to “determine in advance who will face the greatest peril from a newly emerging disease” (Field, 2009, p. 660). Nevertheless, in the case of allocating the vaccine against COVID-19, older generations are given preference since they are at a higher risk of suffering complications. Therefore, younger populations have low priority for vaccines, even though they can become infected as well; therefore, it may be possible that in the future, they will not be given as much attention as they should. In addition, another ethical issue arises in case of essential workers who are favored when allocating vaccines because they contribute to public health. During the epidemic of COVID-19, hospital staff has become the most vulnerable; therefore, it is obvious that they would be prioritized above other patients.
Reference
Field, R. I. (2009). The ethics of allocating vaccines. In V. Ravitsky & A. L. Caplan (Eds.), The Penn Center Guide to Bioethics (pp. 657-665). Springer.