Paternalism and Public Health: Topic Introduction

My topic for writing project #2 is Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). In my project, I will ask whether the government should take a paternalistic approach to regulating GMOs in food products; do the public health costs outweigh peoples’ right to freely consume food products? The central perspective that I have found so far supports the claim that the government should take a paternalistic approach to GMOs. So far, 19 countries of the European Union have voted to ban GMOs in some form, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, and the Netherlands being a few countries that have fully banned GMOs (“Several European countries move to rule out GMOs”). A scientific study I came across found that consuming GMOs can have such serious effects on human health such as a decrease in learning ability and development of tumors that it seems easy to argue that governments should get involved to minimize this threat to public health. Refer here to explore the scientific study. Nevertheless, having the government control something as personal as your diet has paternalistic undertones that can translate as unnecessary or a threat to individual freedom. As a basic human right, individuals should have agency over how they want to live their lives even if this means being aware of health risks and taking them anyway. 

Photo diagram of GM tomatoes next to non GM tomatoes (source: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/health-effects-gmo-foods/story?id=23459884) 

Works Cited

“Several European Countries Move to Rule out GMOs.” Environment European Green Capital, European Commission, ec.europa.eu/environment/europeangreencapital/countriesruleoutgmos/#:~:text=Several%20countries%20such%20as%20France,Scotland%2C%20Wales%20and%20Northern%20Ireland.