There is influenza (i.e., flu) epidemic spreading throughout Georgetown.When an individual gets the disease they must go on a respirator (i.e., breathing machine) in order to be cured.However, even being put on a respirator is no guaranteethat the person will live.If they do not go on the machine there is a good chance they will die.Unfortunately, the hospitals are not equipped to treat everyone who is coming down with the disease as they do not have enough respirators.That means they have to make a determination about who gets a respirator and who does not.In other words, they have to decide who lives and who dies.

Having taken an ethics course and having had two amazing professors, the hospitals decide to put you in charge of determining a system for deciding who should get the respirators and who should not.They give you three options to choose from:

a) You use a lottery system and randomly select which of the infected people gets to be put on a respirator.All those who win the lottery get a respirator.

b) You only give a respirator to those individuals who are most likely to benefit from its use (that is you give the respirators to those who the doctors say have the greatest chance to survive if they are put on it).

c) You operate on a first come first serve basis.You give a respirator to the people who arrive at the hospital first until you are out of respirators.

1.How would you respond in this situation? Which of the three options you would choice and why?

2.Which ethical theories fit the optionyou chose (e.g., teleological, egoism, deontological, virtue ethics, etc.)

3.What could be a 4th option to decide who should get the respirators.Why is this method better for deciding? Which ethical theory does it fit in to?