Donated blood--Gift or commodity?: Some economic and ethical considerations on voluntary vs commercial donation of blood

Hartwig von Schubert

Social Science & Medicine, 1994, vol. 39, issue 2, 201-206

Abstract: The author applies the theory of public goods on donated blood. Donated blood may be taken as a 'public good' like water and air, police and firebrigades. This theory tends to imply a preference for voluntary donation and bloodbanking by public and nonprofit organisations as well as for low cost supply. An additional commercial supply of blood nevertheless is welcome. Quality as well as quantity of blood depend first of all on the willingness to donate and the honesty of the donors about their health. An altruistic motivation alone, which is not triggered by some material incentive, does not in all systems guarantee a sufficient quantity of safe blood. Both the altruistic as well as the reembursement-oriented donor's willingness and honesty have to be guarded by sound practice in bloodbanking and adequate public control within a legal framework which reflects the vital role of blood supply. A legal implementation of product liability will certainly be an important instrument in this field.

Date: 1994
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0277-9536(94)90328-X
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:socmed:v:39:y:1994:i:2:p:201-206

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
http://www.elsevier. ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

Access Statistics for this article

Social Science & Medicine is currently edited by Ichiro (I.) Kawachi and S.V. (S.V.) Subramanian

More articles in Social Science & Medicine from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().