Heinz Dilemma

Heinz Dilemma

     In Europe, a woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one drug that the doctors thought might save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the drug cost him to make. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $ 1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: "No, I discovered the drug and I'm going to make money from it." So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's store to steal the drug-for his wife. Should the husband have done that?

Many would believe that Heinz should not have stolen the drug from the druggist because stealing is against the law and stealing it would have many bad consequences. I personally think that Heinz did the right thing by stealing the drug for his dying wife because life is worth so much more the money, Although he ignored the punishment stage in Kohlberg's moral development and stole the drug, saving his wife's life was a life long benefit.

My mom has had cancer so I can say that if I was put in the situation that Heinz was in for my mom I would have stolen the drug as well. Yes, going to jail would be a life long consequence but knowing that you saved someones life would be worth it to me.

Kolberg's Moral Development