rates of post partum depression are about 10%, higher in adverse circumstances. Depression is one illness where a person’s QALY’s are plausibly <0
Apparently even “Major depressive disorder: severe episode” only costs 0.655 QALYs.. If we generously assume every instance of post partum depression is ‘major’ and ‘severe’, and generously assume it lasts for 3 years, we get 30.10.655 = 0.1965 QALYs. As we were generous on both multiplicative assumptions, it’s plausible the true number is much much lower. Yet even if it was as high as 0.1965, that’s not enough to justify aborting a fetus if you ascribed even a 1% chance of it having moral value.
So perhaps my wording choice could have been better—but I don’t think it actually makes much difference to the object-level issue.
there are different ways of scoring QALYs—most of the constructs seem pretty dumb on the face of it that advantage people with small issues across the board compared to people with life-cripplingly severe issues along one dimension.
Apparently even “Major depressive disorder: severe episode” only costs 0.655 QALYs.. If we generously assume every instance of post partum depression is ‘major’ and ‘severe’, and generously assume it lasts for 3 years, we get 30.10.655 = 0.1965 QALYs. As we were generous on both multiplicative assumptions, it’s plausible the true number is much much lower. Yet even if it was as high as 0.1965, that’s not enough to justify aborting a fetus if you ascribed even a 1% chance of it having moral value.
So perhaps my wording choice could have been better—but I don’t think it actually makes much difference to the object-level issue.
there are different ways of scoring QALYs—most of the constructs seem pretty dumb on the face of it that advantage people with small issues across the board compared to people with life-cripplingly severe issues along one dimension.