Are Fast Food Outlets in Hospitals Ethical?
Hospitals are defined to be places where the ill or sick or infirm individuals are supposed to get well in order to return to their life before they got sick. However, today, one notices that there are many fast food outlets mushrooming around hospital premises, and sometimes within hospital premises! This short paper posits that having fast food outlets around or within hospital premises is unethical, and should not be practiced.
Fast food outlets are known for serving high-calorie, high-sugar and high-cholesterol food. There is evidence already that those who regularly patronize fast food outlets are at risk for obesity and chronic diseases such as heart ailments and diabetes (Martirosyan, 2009). While the patient who is confined in the hospital may be served a diet that conforms to the doctors’ and dietitians’ orders, it may be the caregiver or the visitors of the patient who will patronize these fast food outlets when they drop by to visit the patient. They then put themselves at risk for chronic diseases and obesity when they purchase and partake of fast food items. It is good if they try to purchase the low-fat or diet items on the menu, but by far and large, most of the dishes on the menus of these fast food outlets are loaded with fat, sugar, salt and other artificial food additives. Studies also show that visitors and outpatients are influenced by their visits to the hospital - they tend to consume fast food items as well (Gill, 2012). From the viewpoint of utilitarian ethics, a fast food outlet near or in a hospital is unethical because the consequences for those consuming these fast food items are unhealthy indeed. From the deontological viewpoint, it is also unethical because it is the hospital’s duty to see to it that it helps keep its patients (both inpatients and outpatients), its staff and even the visitors healthy (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2014). Tempting them with fast food loaded with everything that is unhealthy is certainly a violation of this duty. Therefore, based on the above, putting up fast food outlets in or near hospitals is unethical, and must not happen at all.
References
Gill, T. 2012. Fast Food Restaurants Have No Place in Our Hospitals. Retrieved from: http://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-sydney
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2014. Ethics. Retrieved from: www.iep.utm.edu/ethics/
Martirosyan, D. 2009. Functional Foods for Chronic Diseases, Vol. 4. Richardson, TX: FF Publishing.
