Conclusion

At their most basic, the fundamental claims of this book are that first, all people have rights to at least a minimum decent standard of health care which provides reasonable guarantees that they will be able to enjoy their other rights and pursue dignified lives of their choosing. Second, and consequently, all people have corresponding duties to care for and about the health of other people, to ensure that their right to health care can be enjoyed. My goal in this book has therefore been to identify what it is that we must all do, individually and collectively to care for the health of other people. Doing so is a moral imperative I have argued, because of the impact that deprivations of health have on our ability to enjoy other rights, and live meaningful, dignified lives. In doing so, I argued that health is profoundly relational and contingent upon the health and behaviours of other persons. In this chapter, I summarise these arguments, examine some possible objections, and identify areas for future research. In the following section, I first outline the significance of health and the reasons why its significance serves to ground the existence of demanding duties.