•  112
    The case against libertarian arguments for compulsory vaccination
    Journal of Medical Ethics 43 (11): 792-796. 2017.
    In a recent paper in this journal, Jason Brennan correctly notes that libertarians struggle to justify a policy of compulsory vaccination. The most straightforward argument that justifies compulsory vaccination is that such a policy promotes welfare. But libertarians cannot make this argument because they claim that the state is justified only in protecting negative rights, not in promoting welfare. I consider two representative libertarian attempts to justify compulsory vaccination, and I argue…Read more
  •  69
    Why Free Market Rights are not Basic Liberties
    Journal of Value Inquiry 49 (1-2): 47-67. 2015.
    Most liberals agree that governments should protect certain basic liberties, such as freedom of speech, freedom of religion and freedom of the person. Liberals disagree, however, about whether free market rights should also be protected. By “free market rights,” we mean those rights typically associated with laissez-faire economic systems such as freedom of contract, a right to market returns, and claims to privately own the means of production.We do not use the phrase “economic liberties,” as T…Read more
  •  51
    Many of us believe that we can and do have individual obligations to refrain from contributing to massive collective harms – say, from producing luxury greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; however, our individual actions are so small as to be practically meaningless. Can we then, justify the intuition that we ought to refrain? In this paper, we argue that this debate may have been mis-framed. Rather than investigating whether or not we have obligations to refrain from contributing to collective actio…Read more
  •  45
    Anti-Vaxxers, Anti-Anti-Vaxxers, Fairness, and Anger
    Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 31 (1): 17-52. 2021.
    Some parents take advantage of legal exemptions for the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine. While there are a variety of reasons parents do so—including having children with medical conditions that make vaccination medically unsafe—some parents appear to be driven, at least in part, by beliefs that vaccines cause a variety of diseases or conditions, such as autism. Those who delay or refuse the MMR vaccine because of false beliefs about its side effects elicit a strikingly strong response from many w…Read more
  •  42
    Against the Public Goods Conception of Public Health
    Public Health Ethics 13 (3): 225-233. 2020.
    Public health ethicists face two difficult questions. First, what makes something a matter of public health? While protecting citizens from outbreaks of communicable diseases is clearly a matter of public health, is the same true of policies that aim to reduce obesity, gun violence or political corruption? Second, what should the scope of the government’s authority be in promoting public health? May government enact public health policies some citizens reasonably object to or policies that are p…Read more
  •  33
    "Public Health Ethics"
    with Ruth Faden
    Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2020.
    This encyclopedia entry provides an overview of the field of public health ethics. It focuses on what distinguishes public health ethics from other nearby subfields—especially biomedical ethics. It also frames the problems of public health ethics in terms of the concepts of justice and political legitimacy.
  •  24
    COVID-19 vaccine uptake among healthcare workers (HCWs) remains of significant public health concern due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, many healthcare institutions are considering or have implemented COVID-19 vaccine mandates for HCWs. We assess defenses of COVID-19 vaccine mandates for HCWs from both public health and professional ethics perspectives. We consider public health values, professional obligations of HCWs, and the institutional failures in healthcare throughout the …Read more
  •  24
  •  18
    A Public Health Ethics Case for Mitigating Zoonotic Disease Risk in Food Production
    with Jan Dutkiewicz
    Food Ethics 6 (2): 1-25. 2021.
    This article argues that governments in countries that currently permit intensive animal agriculture - especially but not exclusively high-income countries - are, in principle, morally justified in taking steps to restrict or even eliminate intensive animal agriculture to protect public health from the risk of zoonotic pandemics. Unlike many extant arguments for restricting, curtailing, or even eliminating intensive animal agriculture which focus on environmental harms, animal welfare, or the li…Read more
  •  14
    Reciprocity and the ethics of giving during pandemics
    Journal of Social Philosophy 52 (4): 516-535. 2021.
    Journal of Social Philosophy, EarlyView.
  •  14
    Reciprocity, Vulnerability, and the Moral Significance of Herd Immunity
    with Mark Navin
    Journal of Applied Philosophy 40 (4): 725-745. 2023.
    This article proposes a novel defense of vaccine mandates: such policies are justifiable because they protect the capabilities of individuals who cannot cultivate individual immunity against infection. We begin by considering a nearby argument that has recently enjoyed popularity, which claims individuals have an enforceable obligation to get vaccinated because they have benefited from community protection (often referred to as ‘herd immunity’), and thus they ought to do their fair share in sust…Read more
  •  12
    Moral Reasons for Individuals in High-Income Countries to Limit Beef Consumption
    with Jessica Fanzo, Travis N. Rieder, Rebecca McLaren, Ruth Faden, and Anne Barnhill
    Food Ethics 7 (2): 1-27. 2022.
    This paper argues that individuals in many high-income countries typically have moral reasons to limit their beef consumption and consume plant-based protein instead, given the negative effects of beef production and consumption. Beef production is a significant source of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental impacts, high levels of beef consumption are associated with health risks, and some cattle production systems raise animal welfare concerns. These negative effects m…Read more
  •  9
    Does identity-relative paternalism prohibit (future) self-sacrifice? A reply to Wilkinson
    with Charlotte Garstman and Sterre de Jong
    Journal of Medical Ethics 49 (6): 406-408. 2023.
    Paternalism has attracted new defenders in recent years. Such defenders typically either downplay the normative significance of autonomy or deny that we are sufficiently rational for paternalistic interventions to be objectionable.1 Both of these argumentative strategies constitute challenges to John Stuart Mill’s influential anti-paternalistic ‘harm principle’, which states that coercive interference with the liberty of competent adults is justifiable only if such interference prevents harm to …Read more
  •  7
    How Should Governments Make COVID-19 Policy?
    with Anne Barnhill and Trevor Rieder
    The Philosophers' Magazine 95 43-50. 2021.
  •  5
    Ethical Tradeoffs in Public Health Emergency Crisis Communication
    with Anne Barnhill and Ruth R. Faden
    American Journal of Bioethics 24 (4): 83-85. 2024.
    Spitale et al. (2024) address a public health ethics question of great importance: How should governments communicate with the public during public health emergencies? The article highlights severa...