SMOKERS RIGHTS TO HEALTH-CARE

The question whether rights to health care should be altered by smokin g behaviour involves wideranging implications for all who indulge in h azardous behaviours, and involves complex economic utilitarian argumen ts. This paper examines current debate in the UK and suggests the majo r significance of the controversy has been ignored. That this discussi on exists at all implies increasing division over the scope and purpos e of a nationalised health service, bestowing health rights on all. Wh en individuals bear the cost of their own health care, they appear to take responsibility for health implications of personal behaviour, but when the state bears the cost, moral obligations of the community and its doctors to care for those who do not value health are called into question. The debate has far-reaching implications as ethical problem s of smokers' rights to health care are common to situations where hea lth as a value comes into conflict with other values, such as pleasure or wealth.