Matters of life and/or death. Reflections on health care experience: questions of life or cases of death?

The article presents some ethical reflections on
medicine and the problems raised by medical practice,
with specific reference to the treatment of chronically and
terminally-ill patients. With reference to several items in
the contemporary philosophical debate an analysis is
made of the meaning of the terms “person” and “life”,
which are deemed to be the most authentic viewpoints
from which to tackle the issues of sickness and treatment.
The human condition, in its essential aspects (vulnerability,
suffering, dependence) is thus highlighted within the
framework of a reflection on the significance of medicine
as an intrinsically ethical practice. The anthropological
and ethical conception envisaged in these terms is used as
a source from which, at a problematic level, to draw a
number of implications of a legal-political, epistemological
and philosophical nature.