ABSTRACT
All modern healthcare systems face the problem of rising healthcare costs. Innovative developments in medical research continuously open up new and often costly possibilities of diagnostics and treatment, and the demographic changes in modern societies add to an ever increasing demand for interventions of both cure and care. This chapter explains the personal responsibility on a theoretical level has been defended and a way to avoid some of the practical problems connected to implementation proposed. This route may appear to be very complex, but then again using criteria for allocating scarce resources in a principled way always is. One of the many criteria for rationing or allocating healthcare resources transparently will be explored, namely personal responsibility for health. The chapter presents an argument both in favour of and against personal responsibility for health from the point of view of political philosophy.
