Public Health Philosophy

Sometimes you're better off dead
There's a gun in your hand 
And it's pointed at your head
--Pet Shop Boys

Robert Malone proposes that public health policy is built on two philosophies: utilitarianism and Malthusianism.

Utilitarianism posits that the morally right action is the action that does the most good. It is a form of consequentialism--the correct action is assessed solely in terms of results produced. 

Utilitarianism fosters what these pages have deemed 'greater good accounting.' If a program is deemed to help more people than it hurts, then it is deemed a winner.

Malthusianism springs from the writings of political economist Thomas Malthus, who believed that population growth would outstrip food supply and other scarce resources, consequently triggering global poverty and death. 

The central implication of Malthusianism is population control. Limit the number of births so that future standard of living won't be compromised by too many people walking the planet.

Two hundred plus years, and billions of people, later and the world has yet to hit Malthus' dreaded upper bound of population. Why? More people produce more, which alleviates the scarcity that worried Malthus. Moreover, those people innovate, applying capital in manners that improve productivity even more.

Meanwhile, countries that have seen birth rates decline significantly, such as Japan, face major demographic headwinds likely to restrain standard of living in the years ahead.

None of that matters to public health officials, or climate alarmists, or socialists in general. The ingenuity that flows from liberty must be restricted in favor of utilitarian and Malthusian central planning. 

Never mind the misery and chaos that such planning creates...