X's, therefore my healthcare benefits should not be the same as his, even though my healthcare needs are greater.' We all fight for the highest-quality care we can obtain for ourselves and our family. This suggests that healthcare should not be a right connected to one's employment status, or even to one's age -- like food, water, and shelter, it is a universal right needed by all to survive and flourish. The United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control" (cited by Mason 2008).
Were we operating behind a veil of ignorance, and were we told that someone had cancer, but no health insurance, if that person 'might be us' or might be our child we would likely urge...
We would not say we should be bankrupted merely because we were unfortunate enough to contract cancer. Only when we perceive ourselves as one of the healthy, the privileged, and the employed do we think differently. Healthcare also creates fair opportunities for all -- someone who is sick cannot function as well as someone who is healthy. Making healthcare dependant upon employment impedes the success of those individuals who are not from wealthy families with high-quality care from birth onward.
Works Cited
Freeman, Samuel. (2008, December 20). Original Position. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved April 20, 2009 at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/original-position/
Mason, Vanessa. (2008, August 12). Universal healthcare. Retrieved April 20, 2009 at http://vanessamason.wordpress.com/2008/08/12/universal-health-care-series-the-moral-argument/
