Write a 1 page opinion on “Blood for Sale” article.
CHAPTER TWO NORMATIVE T HEORIES OF E THICS 77 consideration to the interests of each affected party. Do
you think Ford did this?
4. Is cost-bene ft analysis a legitimate tool? What role, if any, should it play in moral deliberation? Critically assess the
example of cost-bene ft analysis given in the case study. Is there anything unsatisfactory about it? Could it have been
improved upon in some way?
5. Speculate about Kant’s response to the idea of placing a monetary value on a human life. Is doing so ever morally
legitimate?
6. What responsibilities to its customers do you think Ford had? What are the most important moral rights, if any,
operating in the Pinto case?
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
7. Would it have made a moral difference if the savings resulting from not improving the Pinto gas tank had been
passed on to Ford’s customers? Could a rational customer have chosen to save a few dollars and risk having the more dangerous gas tank? What if Ford had told potential customers about its decision?
8. The maxim of Ford’s action might be stated thus: “When the cost of a safety improvement would hurt the bottom line, it’s all right not to make it.” Can this maxim be universalized? Does it treat humans as ends in them-selves? Would manufacturers be willing to abide by it if the positions were reversed and they were in the role of consumers?
9. Should Ford have been found guilty of criminal homicide in the Ulrich case?
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
10. Was GM responsible for Shannon Moseley’s death? Compare that case with the case of Ford and the Pinto.
11. Assess Ford’s and GM’s actions with respect to SUV roll-overs. Have the auto-makers met their moral obligation to
consumers, or have they acted wrongly by not doing more to increase SUV safety? Should they be held either mor -ally or legally responsible for deaths from roll-overs that would not have occurred in other vehicles? What should automakers do to increase SUV safety?
12. Is it wrong for business to sell a product that is not as safe as it could be, given current technology? Is it wrong to sell a vehicle that is less safe than competing products on the market? Are there limits to how far automakers must go in the name of safety?
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
S OL LEV IN WAS A SUCCESSFU L STOCKBROK ER IN Tampa, Florida, when he recognized the potentially prof table
market for safe and uncontaminated blood and, with some colleagues, founded Plasma International. Not everybody is willing to make money by selling his or her own blood, and in the beginning Plasma International bought blood from people addicted to drugs and alcohol. Although innovative marketing increased Plasma International’s sales dramatically, several cases of hepatitis were reported in recipients. The company then began looking for new sources of blood.
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Plasma International searched worldwide and, with the advice of a qualifed team of medical consultants, did extensive testing. C ASE 2.3
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
Blood for S ale
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78 PA RT ONE MORAL PHILOSOPHY AN D BUSI N ESS
Eventually they found that the blood profles of several rural West African tribes made them ideal prospective donors. After negotia-tions with the local government, Plasma International signed an agreement with several tribal chieftains to purchase blood.
Business went smoothly and proftably for Plasma International until a Tampa paper charged that Plasma was
purchasing blood for as little as ffteen cents a pint and then reselling it to hospitals in the United States and South America for $25 per pint. In one recent disaster, the newspaper alleged, Plasma International had sold 10,000 pints, netting nearly a quarter of a million dollars.
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
The newspaper story stirred up controversy in Tampa, but the existence of commercialized blood marketing systems in the United States is nothing new. Approximately half the blood and plasma obtained in the United States is bought and sold like any other commodity. By contrast, the National Health Service in Great Britain relies entirely on a voluntary system of blood donation. Blood is neither bought nor sold. It is available to anyone who needs it without charge or obligation, and donors gain no preference over nondonors.
In an important study, economist Richard Titmuss showed that the British system works better than the American one in terms of economic and administrative ef fciency, price, and blood quality. The commercialized blood market, Titmuss argued, is wasteful of blood and plagued by shortages. In the United States, bureaucratization, paperwork, and administra -tive overhead result in a cost per unit of blood that is five to ffteen times higher than in Great Britain. Hemophiliacs, in particular, are disadvantaged by the U.S. system and have enormous bills to pay. In addition, commercial markets are much more likely to distribute contaminated blood.
Titmuss also argued that the existence of a commercialized system discourages voluntary donors. People are less apt to give blood if they know that others are selling it. Psychologists have found similar conficts between fnancial incentives and moral or altruistic conduct in other areas.
22
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
Philosopher Peter Singer has elaborated on this point in the case of blood: If blood is a commodity with a price, to give blood means merely to save someone money. Blood has a cash value of a certain number of dollars, and the
importance of the gift will vary with the wealth of the recipient. If blood cannot be bought, however, the gift’s
value depends upon the need of the recipient. Often, it will be worth life itself. Under these circumstances
blood becomes a very special kind of gift, and giving it means providing for strangers, without hope of reward,
something they cannot buy and without which they may die. The gift relates strangers in a manner that is
not possible when blood is a commodity.
This may sound like a philosopher’s abstraction, far removed from the thoughts of ordinary people. On
the contrary, it is an idea spontaneously expressed by British donors in response to Titmuss’s questionnaire.
As one woman, a machine operator, wrote in reply to the question why she frst decided to become a blood
donor: “You can’t get blood from supermarkets and chain stores. People themselves must come forward;
sick people can’t get out of bed to ask you for a pint to save their life, so I came forward in hopes to help
somebody who needs blood.”
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
The implication of this answer, and others like it, is that even if the formal right to give blood can coexist
with commercialized blood banks, the respondent’s action would have lost much of its signi fcance to
her, and the blood would probably not have been given at all. When blood is a commodity, and can be
purchased if it is not given, altruism becomes unnec-essary, and so loosens the bonds that can otherwise
exist between strangers in a community. The exist-ence of a market in blood does not threaten the for-mal right to give blood, but it does away with the right to give blood which cannot be bought, has no cash value, and must be given freely if it is to be obtained at all. If there is such a right, it is incompatible with the right to sell blood, and we cannot avoid violating one of these rights when we grant the other. 23
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
Both Titmuss and Singer believe that the weakening of the spirit of altruism in this sphere has important repercussions. It marks, they think, the increasing commercialization of our lives and makes similar changes in attitude, motive, and rela -tionships more likely in other felds.
Update
Dr. Arthur Matas, a prominent kidney-transplant surgeon, is
pushing for one change that it’s doubtful either Titmuss or Singer
would like. Lately, he’s been traveling the United States making
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content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s). Editorial review has
deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
CHAPTER TWO NORMATIVE T HEORIES OF E THICS 79
the case for lifting the legal ban on kidney sales. That ban was imposed in 1984 by an outraged Congress after a Virginia physi-cian had proposed buying kidneys from poor people and selling them to the highest bidder. By contrast, Dr. Matas isn’t trying to make money. He would like the government to handle kidney sales, and the kidneys to go to whoever is at the top of the current waiting list, whether the patient is rich or poor. And that list grows
longer every year as the gap continues to widen—it’s now nearly fve to one—between patients in need and the number of kid -neys available from either living or deceased donors. With eligible patients often waiting for fve or six years,
more and more people are taking Dr. Matas seriously, but many experts still balk at the idea of organ sales. One of them is Dr. Francis Delmonico, a professor at Harvard University and president of the network that runs the nation’s organ-distribution system. He worries that Dr. Matas’ plan would exploit the poor and vulnerable, that it would cause altruistic kidney donations to wither, and that wealthy patients would manage to fnd a way around a regulated market to get a kidney faster. 24
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
D IS C USSION QUESTIONS
1. Is Sol Levin running a business “just like any other busi -ness,” or is his company open to moral criticism? Defend your answer by appeal to moral principle.
2. Did Plasma International strike a fair bargain with the West Africans who supplied their blood to the company? Or is
Plasma guilty of exploiting them in some way? Explain your answer.
3. What are the contrasting ideals of the British and U.S. blood systems? Which system, in your opinion, better
promotes human freedom and respect for people? Which system better promotes the supply of blood?
4. Examine the pros and cons of commercial transactions in blood from the egoistic, the utilitarian, and the Kantian
perspectives.
Moral Philosophy and Business of Selling Blood
5. Are Titmuss and Singer correct to suggest that the buying and selling of blood reduces altruism? Does knowing that
you can sell your blood (and that others are selling theirs) make you less inclined to donate your blood?
6. Singer suggests that although the right to sell blood does not threaten the formal right to give blood, it is incompat-ible with “the right to give blood, which cannot be bought, which has no cash value, and must be given freely if it is to be obtained at all.” Assess that idea. Is there such a right?
7. Many believe that commercialization is increasing in all areas of modern life. If so, is it something to be applauded
or condemned? Is it wrong to treat certain things—such as human organs—as commodities?
8. Do you believe that we have a moral duty to donate blood? If so, why and under what circumstances? If
not, why not?
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