The healing philosopher: John Locke's medical ethics

Abstract

This article examines a heretofore unexplored facet of John Locke's philosophy. Locke was a medical doctor and he also wrote about medical issues that are controversial today. Despite this, Locke's medical ethics has yet to be studied. An analysis of Locke's education and his teachers and colleagues in the medical profession, of the 17th century Hippocratic Oath, and of the reaction to the last recorded outbreak of the bubonic plague in London, shines some light on the subject of Locke's medical ethics. The study of Locke's medical ethics confirms that he was a deontologist who opposed all suicide and abortion through much of pregnancy.