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Response
Canadian perspective on ageism and selective lockdown: a response to Savulescu and Cameron
  1. Hayden P Nix1,2
  1. 1 Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, Oxford University, Oxford, Oxfordshire, UK
  2. 2 Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada
  1. Correspondence to Hayden P Nix, Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, Oxford University, Oxford, Oxfordshire, UK; hnix{at}uwo.ca

Abstract

In a recent article, ‘Why lockdown of the elderly is not ageist and why levelling down equality is wrong’, Savulescu and Cameron argue that a selective lockdown of older people is not ageist because it would treat people unequally based on morally relevant differences. This response argues that a selective lockdown of older people living in long-term care homes would be unjust because it would allow the expansive liberties of the general public to undermine the basic liberties of older people, and because it would discriminate on the basis of extrinsic disadvantages.

  • COVID-19
  • ethics
  • public health ethics

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https://bmj.com/coronavirus/usage

https://doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2021-107315

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    Footnotes

    • Twitter @HaydenPNix

    • Contributors HPN is the sole author of this article.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; internally peer reviewed.

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