Law, Immunization and the Right to Die focuses on the urgent matter of legal appeals and judicial decisions on assisted death. Drawing on key cases from the United Kingdom and Canada, the book focuses on the problematic paternalism of legal decisions that currently deny assisted dying and questions why the law fails to recognize what many describe as "compassionate motives" for assisted death. When cases are analyzed as discourses that are part of a larger socio-political logic of governance, judicial decisions, it is argued here, reveal themselves as relying on the construction of neoliberal fictions – fictions that are here elucidated with reference to Michel Foucault’s theoretical insights on pastoral power and Roberto Esposito’s philosophical thesis on immunization. Challenging the socio-political logic of neoliberalism, the issue of assisted dying goes beyond the predominant legal concern with protecting – or immunizing – individuals from one another, in favor of minimal interference. This book calls for a new kind of politics: one that might affirm people and their finitude both more collectively, and more compassionately.

Law, Immunization and the Right to Die focuses on the urgent matter of legal appeals and judicial decisions on assisted death. Drawing on key cases from the United Kingdom and Canada, the book focuses on the problematic paternalism of legal decisions that currently deny assisted dying and questions why the law fails to recognize what many describe as "compassionate motives" for assisted death. When cases are analyzed as discourses that are part of a larger socio-political logic of governance, judicial decisions, it is argued here, reveal themselves as relying on the construction of neoliberal fictions – fictions that are here elucidated with reference to Michel Foucault’s theoretical insights on pastoral power and Roberto Esposito’s philosophical thesis on immunization. Challenging the socio-political logic of neoliberalism, the issue of assisted dying goes beyond the predominant legal concern with protecting – or immunizing – individuals from one another, in favor of minimal interference. This book calls for a new kind of politics: one that might affirm people and their finitude both more collectively, and more compassionately.

Vaccination is a fundamental component of preventive medicine and public health. The use of vaccines to prevent infectious diseases has resulted in dramatic decreases in disease, disability, and death in the United States and around the world. The current political, economic, and social environment presents both opportunities for and challenges to strengthening the U.S. system for developing, manufacturing, regulating, distributing, funding, and administering safe and effective vaccines for all people. Priorities for the National Vaccine Plan examines the extraordinarily complex vaccine enterprise, from research and development of new vaccines to financing and reimbursement of immunization services. Priorities for the National Vaccine Plan examines the extraordinarily complex vaccine enterprise, from research and development of new vaccines to financing and reimbursement of immunization services. The book makes recommendations about priority actions in the update to the National Vaccine Plan that are intended to achieve the objectives of disease prevention and enhancement of vaccine safety. It is centered on the plan's five goals in the areas of vaccine development, safety, communication, supply and use, and global health.

Parents have come to depend on vaccines to protect their children from a variety of diseases. Some evidence suggests, however, that vaccination against pertussis (whooping cough) and rubella (German measles) is, in a small number of cases, associated with increased risk of serious illness. This book examines the controversy over the evidence and offers a comprehensively documented assessment of the risk of illness following immunization with vaccines against pertussis and rubella. Based on extensive review of the evidence from epidemiologic studies, case histories, studies in animals, and other sources of information, the book examines: The relation of pertussis vaccines to a number of serious adverse events, including encephalopathy and other central nervous system disorders, sudden infant death syndrome, autism, Guillain-Barre syndrome, learning disabilities, and Reye syndrome. The relation of rubella vaccines to arthritis, various neuropathies, and thrombocytopenic purpura. The volume, which includes a description of the committee's methods for evaluating evidence and directions for future research, will be important reading for public health officials, pediatricians, researchers, and concerned parents.

Introduction : our immunization social order -- How are vaccines political? -- The solution of the vaccine court -- Health and rights in the vaccine-critical movement -- Knowing vaccine injury through law -- What counts as evidence? -- The autism showdown -- Conclusion : the epistemic politics of the vaccine court.

This open access book discusses individual, collective, and institutional responsibilities with regard to vaccination from the perspective of philosophy and public health ethics. It addresses the issue of what it means for a collective to be morally responsible for the realisation of herd immunity and what the implications of collective responsibility are for individual and institutional responsibilities. The first chapter introduces some key concepts in the vaccination debate, such as ‘herd immunity’, ‘public goods’, and ‘vaccine refusal’; and explains why failure to vaccinate raises certain ethical issues. The second chapter analyses, from a philosophical perspective, the relationship between individual, collective, and institutional responsibilities with regard to the realisation of herd immunity. The third chapter is about the principle of least restrictive alternative in public health ethics and its implications for vaccination policies. Finally, the fourth chapter presents an ethical argument for unqualified compulsory vaccination, i.e. for compulsory vaccination that does not allow for any conscientious objection. The book will appeal to philosophers interested in public health ethics and the general public interested in the philosophical underpinning of different arguments about our moral obligations with regard to vaccination.

This book analyses assisted death in the philosophical context of biopolitics, searching for the form of resistance which would not produce ‘bare life’ and would not exclude marginalized social groups. A great deal of the criticism of euthanasia from pro-life movements associates this term with the Nazi practice of eugenics, and this book considers the inescapability of the Holocaust in this regard, while also moving the discussion on assisted death in new directions.