Children of lesser gods

I have been contemplating the value of human life, wondering if life is innately of value, or is some life more valuable than others. Is the life of the alcoholic as important or as valuable as that of the school teacher of pharmacist? Are nurses more valuable than rapist? who places value to human life, and are there different levels of humanity? Should people be ascribed value based on occupation or social contribution, education or wealth, the argument seams always to be framed in camps that are in conceptual opposition. You are either a bleeding heart liberal or a hard nose conservative but reality often times is much less polorized.

The question is how can we not label people; This I venture to say is impossible. The problem with labeling is that it has the potential to affect the quality of care that is delivered based on the value that we placed on the patient. As a human being the concept of all being equal is designed to provide the platform upon which care is provided and although this may sound great, in reality we know that there is no such thing as people being equal. Equality is a socio political construct, designed to maintain the social compact, in which people co exist feeling good about themself despite all their shortcomings. The equality philosophy is a lie. We are never equal from birth to death, we are born with different capacities to learn and grow, with different needs and desires, different strength and weakness.

As health care providers, we need to be mindful of these labels and try to find some unifying quality among patients in order that we provide compassionate care to all. This may require that we embrace a work philosophy which can sustain us through difficult and trying days, for some they may need to call upon their faith, for others, it may come from a strong desire to live up to a professional code, for in a profession in which we are at constant risk for becoming apathetic and desentisized to the suffering of those we treat. It is important that we keep a constant check of our humanity, or we may find ourselves treating some patients as though they were children of lesser gods.