This morning, I was listening to The Ethicist, a podcast from the New York Times, while I was driving to work.

(The actual episode is for today's date, Feb. 29 -- http://podcasts.nytimes.com/podcasts/2008/02/28/29cohen.mp3 )

In the podcast, he states without qualification, "Everyone has a moral right to healthcare."

The way he phrased the statement indicated to me he considered the concept self evident. Which reminded me of a conversation I had with my brother a few weeks back about healthcare, in which he stated it wasn't a right.

I did a quick Google search for health care is a moral right to see what kind of results I would get. Predictably, I got both sides of the issue in the top 10 results.

Affirming the positive, an article on emaxhealth.com states, "A fundamental measure of our society is how we care for the poor and vulnerable. It is not acceptable that millions of people in our country and hundreds of thousands in Kentucky do not have access to affordable health care. We need a new commitment in our nation and our Commonwealth to insure access to affordable health care for all in a way that reflects a priority concern for the poor." (From http://www.emaxhealth.com/72/3931.html )

But affirming the negative, aynrand.org states in part, "Observe that all legitimate rights have one thing in common: they are rights to action, not to rewards from other people. The American rights impose no obligations on other people, merely the negative obligation to leave you alone. The system guarantees you the chance to work for what you want—not to be given it without effort by somebody else." (From http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?id=13873&page=NewsArticle )

I haven't had a chance to read these articles very closely, but thought I'd share them with you and see what you think about the subject.

Do you think healthcare is a right?

If not, should it be?