Health Reform: What's Insurance Got To Do With It? Recognizing Health Insurance As A Separate Species Of Insurance,
2010
Boston University School of Law
Health Reform: What's Insurance Got To Do With It? Recognizing Health Insurance As A Separate Species Of Insurance, Wendy K. Mariner
Faculty Scholarship
Health insurance can be, and to a large extent already is, a separate species of insurance. This article describes the different views of insurance that made health reform contentious. It argues that the goals of health reform are incompatible with conventional views of insurance. Nonetheless, reforming health insurance to achieve those goals does not require as dramatic shift as some might think, because health insurance has already become primarily a means of paying for health care, rather than a simple risk spreading device for specified losses.
Human Rights And American Bioethics: Resistance Is Futile,
2010
Boston University School of Law
Human Rights And American Bioethics: Resistance Is Futile, George J. Annas
Faculty Scholarship
The Borg are always confident that humans will be assimilated into their collective hive and therefore that, as they say, “resistance is futile.” In Star Trek, of course, the humans always successfully resist. Elizabeth Fenton and John Arras, like the Borg, resist the idea that humans are uniquely special as well as the utility of the human rights framework for global bioethics. I believe their resistance to human rights is futile, and I explain why in this essay. Let me begin with their subtitle, because we do seem to agree that popular culture is a powerful aid to understanding human …
