Premature Death as a Normative Concept

Preben Sørheim; Mathias Barra; Ole Frithjof Norheim; Espen Gamlund; Carl Tollef Solberg

doi:10.1007/s10728-023-00471-x

Premature Death as a Normative Concept

Health Care Anal. 2024 Jun;32(2):88-105. doi: 10.1007/s10728-023-00471-x. Epub 2024 Jan 26.

Authors

Preben Sørheim¹, Mathias Barra^{2

3}, Ole Frithjof Norheim^{3

4}, Espen Gamlund⁵, Carl Tollef Solberg^{2

6}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Humanities, University of Bergen, Sydnesplassen 1213, Postbox 7805, 5020, Bergen, Norway. [email protected].
² The Health Services Research Unit-HØKH, Akershus University Hospital, Lørenskog, Norway.
³ Department of Global Public Health and Primary Care, Faculty of Medicine, Bergen Centre for Ethics and Priority Setting-BCEPS, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway.
⁴ Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University, Boston, USA.
⁵ Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Humanities, University of Bergen, Sydnesplassen 1213, Postbox 7805, 5020, Bergen, Norway.
⁶ Faculty of Medicine, Centre for Medical Ethics (CME), Institute of Health and Society, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.

Abstract

The practical goal of preventing premature death seems uncontroversial. But the term 'premature death' is vague with several, sometimes conflicting definitions. This ambiguity results in several conceptions with which not all will agree. Moreover, the normative rationale behind the goal of preventing premature deaths is masked by the operational definition of existing measures. In this article, we argue that 'premature death' should be recognized as a normative concept. We propose that normative theories should be used to justify measures of premature death to provide them with normative validity and public legitimacy.

Keywords: Death; Epidemiology; Ethics; Philosophy; Public policy.

MeSH terms

Humans
Life Expectancy
Mortality, Premature*

Grants and funding

303724/Norges Forskningsråd