LBJ's (Not So) Great Society After 50 Years: A Poor Health Legacy
Wednesday, February 11th
12:30-1:30pm
Jordan Conference Center Auditorium
University of Virginia School of Medicine
Erika Blacksher, PhD
Assistant Professor, Department of Bioethics and Humanities
University of Washington, Seattle WA
Fifty years ago President Lyndon B. Johnson envisioned a Great Society, an America free from poverty and racial injustice and full of equality of opportunity and social mobility for all. Many legislative planks of his Great Society platform -- civil and voting rights, educational opportunity, fair housing practices, urban planning, mass transit, and health care -- represent what we today consider "social determinants of health." This Medical Center Hour with bioethicist Erika Blacksher reviews how Americans are faring today in relation to key aspirations of LBJ's Great Society, especially those that bear on health. Americans generally live shorter, less healthy lives than their counterparts in peer nations, and within the U.S. health varies dramatically among social and economic groups and from region to region. What ethical concerns are raised by significant health disparities? Are such disparities unjust, as many in public health assume? If so, what are our responsibilities and, what ethical limits might constrain our pursuit of a more equitable distribution of health?
