Questions Presented for Class:

QUESTION #1.) What makes an opinion different from a "fact"? Are all opinions equally valid? If so, why? If not, why not? What impact do opinions and "facts" have on individual consumer health and on the health of a whole population of consumers?

QUESTION #2.) In our Public Health Code of Ethics, an underlying value is that "Humans have a right to the resources necessary for health" (Public Health Leadership Society, 2002, p. 2). How does this underlying value add to our basic three ethics to help explain why the majority of public health professionals do not encourage using the free market perspective as a base for health care systems?

QUESTION #3.) When looking at the "new media" out there - the grassroots groups on the web, Twitters that seem to get a lot of attention, talk radio, 24-hour news channels, etc - do you see more of the market perspective or more that appears to be based on a Public Health ethics perspective? What does the general public need to know? What are the barriers to them knowing it?


1.) An opinion is a belief or feeling someone has towards a certain subject. There can be an infinite amount of opinions towards a given subject and none are technically wrong because that is their belief or feeling. A fact on the other hand is something researched, proven, or equally accepted as fact. I believe all opinions are not equally valid. Opinions are like the brain, everyone has them but they are all quite different. Some are based off of facts and some are just pulled out of misinformation. No one opinion is necessarily more right than the next, but an opinion based on fact would hold more creditable than one of no fact. More people may agree with a certain opinion, but that does not mean it is a fact. Facts and opinions impact consumer health immensely. Not everyone knows the facts or what is true about a product, but an opinion can spread like wildfire and either help or hinder a consumer when considering a product. Facts are what the consumer needs to know, but if the facts are not out there and only opinions are the whole population of consumers are not aware if whether a product is god or bad in terms of their health. Consumers need to be aware and able to recognize what information is fact and what is opinion. For example the Flu Vaccine, fact is that it is a dead virus that is inserted in the body. Opinion would be that it makes them ill afterwards so many consumers will not get the Flu Vaccine even though it is very helpful in keeping their health up during Flu season.
2.) This value is very important because consumers need to know what it is they are consuming. The government puts policies and regulations in place that help make sure information and products display important information and that consumers have easy access to the information they need before consuming a product. Health professionals discourage a free market perspective because then the government policies and regulations will no longer be in place and consumers do not have that safety net of information there for them. Without policies requiring information be available on products there is not much incentive for product companies to let the consumer know what they are really buying which can put consumers in danger.
3.) There is a lot of “new media” out there and one issue is that older generations and underprivileged generations do not have access or knowledge to use these new forms of media. There is a market perspective in this new media rather than public health ethics. The public needs all the information that is out there because it all can affect them in one way or another. Everything should be available to the public, but one barrier that one encounters is that not everyone has access or the knowledge needed to access this information. The government really tries to have everything available to the public, but it is difficult when low income communities do not have cable or internet, or if there is not a local library. It can be difficult for some people to find access to this information.