Several epidemiological metrics exist to inform determinations of whether an epidemic or pandemic has ended, e.g., when a disease has become relatively stable, predictable, and manageable, and disease rates have been reduced to an ‘acceptable’ level. However, decisions about whether and when the pandemic has ‘begun’ or ‘ended’ inherently have social, cultural, political, economic, and ethical dimensions and implications. Important questions arise about who should be involved in decision-making about matters such as what constitutes an ‘acceptable’ level of disease, and about considerations that should inform such determinations. This seminar will examine the ethical dimensions of determinations of when epidemics and pandemics begin and end.
Chair:
Patricia Kingori, Professor of Global Health Ethics, Ethox Centre, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Panel:
Suerie Moon, Co-Director, Global Health Centre, Professor of Practice, Interdisciplinary Programmes and International Relations/Political Science, The Graduate Institute Geneva, Switzerland
Ruipeng Lei, Professor of Bioethics Executive Director, Center for Bioethics, Vice Dean, School of the Humanities, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China
Third speaker TBC