The Human Right to Health and Experimental Medicine

MASTROLEO, IGNACIO

Buenos Aires

Workshop; The Political Philosophy of Economic and Social Human Rights: Principles for Progressive Realisation; 2017

UK-Latin America Political Philosophy Research Network

The aim of this paper is to present a normative justification of post-trial access to beneficial investigational medicine for individual research participants if needed (reasonable post-trial provisions). I call this interpretation the egalitarian model. The main thesis of the egalitarian model is that reasonable post-trial provisions are part of the set of obligations to protect and promote health for all people, and it correlates with the right to health. To show how the model works I will analyze the case of post-trial access to beneficial investigational medicine, and the recruitment of uninsured research participants. I will argue that an implication of requiring reasonable post-trial provisions in a context of unfair health inequalities is that the group of uninsured or underinsured research subjects may be in a vulnerable situation, that is, they have an increased likelihood of not being recruited compared to insured individual participants with the exact same condition and health status (discrimination) or of being recruited without appropriate post-trial healthcare provisions after trial (exploitation). If my argument is sound, only an egalitarian model can justify avoiding both problems