In 2020, the pandemic forced the government to pass the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (the FFCRA) and the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES). The policies affected the private health coverage use in the national attempt to maximize the accessibility of COVID-19 diagnostic testing and treatment. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Departments of Labor and the Treasury developed a set of regulations to make Americans benefit from their insurance and receive essential coronavirus-related services at no cost (The 116th Congress, 2020). The policy can be viewed as beneficial for the collective good; however, tensions between the public impact and individual rights occurred. Indeed Saleh et al. (2021) claim that “to ensure a more efficient implementation of the policies produced, all of these aspects should involve the participation of different stockholders, undertaking transparency, and taking cultural differences into account” (p. 649918). This paper aims to explain how COVID-19 healthcare policies caused tensions between individual rights and the collective good and discuss their legal and ethical considerations.
The FFCRA and the CARES Acts became the earliest response of the US government to the COVID-19 outbreak as the urge to enforce the healthcare system occurred with the rapidly growing incidence. The most prominent update addressed the taxpayers’ money and private insurance revision to retrieve additional funding for hospitals and make supporting payouts for citizens (Khullar et al., 2020). Furthermore, such populations as the impoverished and the elderly were at a higher risk of facing severe consequences, enabling the legislators to create effective diagnosis, prevention, and treatment measures (Young et al., 2020). The actions helped the administration develop the $175 billion emergency fund to serve the collective good of addressing the COVID-19 challenge (Khullar et al., 2020). The pandemic’s public health Acts caused tension between individual rights and the collective interest because legislation addressed the issues of an average citizen, while the American nation is exceptionally diverse. Consequently, multiple populations, families, and communities experienced difficulties receiving the high-quality health care they legally deserved.
Public health has a greater authority over an individual’s rights in terms of national healthcare; thus, policymakers consider it the primary beneficiary. Legal considerations of the FFCRA and the CARES Acts address the groups with specific socioeconomic statuses, states, or organizations, yet no legislative regulation is developed for individuals (Kanter et al., 2021). Consequently, in the case if, for instance, an individual with severe diabetes conditions seeks additional insurance coverage or urgent help, they might face rejection if the request disrupts the COVID-19 response program.
An organization’s priority for addressing the pandemic might be legally and socially explainable; however, it disrupts the medical ethics principles. Indeed, beneficence must enable a healthcare provider to help a patient in need, and non-maleficence must allow them to do no harm and take action to decrease the possible hurting (Bodenheimer & Grumbach, 2020). Then, the concept of justice requires equally fair treatment (Bodenheimer & Grumbach, 2020). The inability of a person with severe chronic conditions to receive timely assistance during the pandemic disrupts the three ethical principles described above, making the recent public health actions non-applicable for individual rights (Saleh et al., 2021). Moreover, legal considerations of the FFCRA and the CARES Acts were developed to make the regulations applicable to all states with diverse administrations and laws. Thus, the policymakers were forced to view the nation as diverse populations and groups of citizens rather than individuals with specific conditions, income levels, and insurance capabilities.
The FFCRA and the CARES Acts passed by the government in 2020 to make healthcare organizations generate additional funding to address the COVID-19 pandemic were beneficial for the collective good. Indeed, they included the conditions to serve the nation’s need for receiving urgent coronavirus testing, diagnosis, and treatment to decrease the infection spread. However, individual rights were not considered and caused tensions as people with chronic diseases, or specific conditions could not get priority healthcare.