Healthcare practitioners' ethical and legal obligations towards hunger strikers

Abstract

When faced with a hunger striking prisoner, health practitioners face the dilemma of their ethical duty to save lives on the one hand and their duty to respect the patient/prisoner’s right to autonomy on the other. Whilst some regimes opt for the approach that force-feeding should be mandatory, other bodies such as the World Medical Association favour the approach that force-feeding is cruel, inhuman and degrading. I take this further and argue that it also amounts to torture. There is insufficient guidance for health practitioners dealing with hunger striking prisoners. I therefore explore this topic further and provide insights as well as make proposals for health practitioners who find themselves in this situation. I examine the various methods used to force-feed a hunger striker, most of which are extremely cruel and inhuman, and demonstrate how these methods fall within the definition of torture. I look at the ways in which various countries around the world respond to hunger strikers and use these to highlight and illustrate some of my arguments and proposals. I also examine the ethical situation regarding force-feeding and make proposals regarding a health practitioner’s ethical obligations towards hunger strikers.