Other
SOUNDINGS
Healthism and eugenics
BMJ 2005; 331 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.331.7513.411-a (Published 11 August 2005) Cite this as: BMJ 2005;331:411- Imre Loefler, editor
- Nairobi Hospital Proceedings, Kenya
Healthism resembles moral rearmament. It wishes to change mankind by controlling people's lifestyles. As healthism gets increasingly coercive, eugenic considerations may crowd out reproductive choice.
Versions of healthism have surfaced before. Two examples are Sparta and the Third Reich, both of which practised genetic selection. In Sparta, if an infant was considered to be defective it was discarded—taken to Taygetos, the mountain where hyenas …
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