[unishark]

> It's unethical and classist to pick-and-choose who gets life-saving cancer treatment based on their income.

Since we're talking ethics, do you also think universal healthcare should be provided by wealthy nations to all the world? Otherwise we are just picking and choosing based on where someone happens to be born, aren't we?

[kevingadd]

That question doesn't matter because national sovereignty would prevent other countries from doing that even if they wanted to. It's not a program it's even possible to consider without some really elaborate treaties that many countries would reject.

At the core of it what you're basically arguing is that nations are unethical because what citizenship someone holds influences things like their access to health care, and the solution to that would probably look a lot like the EU but completely borderless world-wide (with no immigrations or customs departments?)

I think you know how people would react to that. It's a pointless 'gotcha' question

[unishark]

The logistics don't seem difficult at all to me if there's a will. People tend to be pretty accommodating when it comes to letting you give them money. At the very least, countries can offer a "medical visa" option to visitors.

As for national borders being unethical by nature, if that logically follows then why not?

I certainly don't consider ethics a source of "gotcha" questions, but of real conundrums.

[AQuantized]

As far as I'm aware, the NHS provides free healthcare to people visiting the UK.

As regards providing free healthcare to anyone regardless of country, that seems next to impossible without providing the infrastructure necessary within the country they live, which would indeed be very difficult to work out. It seems like a good goal to work towards - everyone regardless of nation having access to reasonable quality healthcare.

[Diggsey]

> People tend to be pretty accommodating when it comes to letting you give them money.

Not really. A huge amount of charity money supposedly going to the poor in other countries is actually used to bribe officials in those countries to allow the aid to be delivered. Any attempt to give healthcare to people in those countries would also be seen as foreign interference, and suffer the same problems.

[unishark]

Corruption is simply part of the price of operating cost in developing countries, not an impenetrable barrier.