Case
DUTY OR CARE? A PHYSICIAN’S ETHICAL DILEMMA OF WORKING IN COVID-19 PANDEMIC
INDUSTRY :HEALTH CARE
AREA :BUSINESS ETHICS
ORGANIZATION :-
LENGTH :10
LUMS No :24-005-2020-1
PUBLICATION YEAR : 2020
ABSTRACT:
This case analyzes the dilemma of healthcare professional’s duty to treat during pandemics. This case discusses this challenge specifically in the context of COVID-19 pandemic which started in December 2019 and was still ongoing at the time of writing this case (mid 2020). The case details the account of a women physician working in a large tertiary care hospital in Punjab, Pakistan. Like many other countries, COVID-19 had wreaked havoc with the healthcare system. Doctors and nurses did not have access to adequate personal protective equipment. They were also chronically understaffed and working in an infrastructure where many of the standard operating procedures and guidelines for safety of patients and doctors could not be ensured. Sidrah was a conscientious doctor, but she faced conflicting loyalties: She had a family with multiple at-risk and vulnerable people, contact with whom she could not avoid. Now she may have potentially exposed them all to a deadly virus with no cure and she had to decide which come first: duty to her profession or responsibility to care for her family.(LUMS No. assigned 28-Dec-2020, disguised case)