Rational and ethical consequences of crisis management on the example of the Covid-19 epidemic

Abstract

This text explores the difference between rational decisionmaking in crisis situations and ethical assumptions of action (imperatives). The paper starts from the hypothesis that socially responsible decisionmaking should be based on the theory of rational choice, that is, that the deontological principles of patient care and the implementation of prophylaxis and treatment are necessarily opposed to the rationally calculated social interest. Analyzing the methods of rational decision-making in a crisis situation, on the example of the Spanish flu and Covid-19 epidemics, and the ethical imperatives of utilitarian and deontological ethics, the paper, using a comparative method, comes to the following conclusions: (1) that crisis decision-making cannot be determined by Pareto-optimality, and (2) that in major crisis situations, such as a pandemic, rational decision-making appropriate to crisis management is necessary, which can only be related to the utilitarianism of consequences.