It depends on whether you take a person-affecting view or totalist view. On the former, the baby isn’t a person (and won’t be, if you don’t save him/her), and so does not and never will have actual preferences in not dying (since that requires fairly sophisticated views of self over time etc). Hence, despite the fact that saving the baby will achieve comparatively more QALYs, there’s nothing wrong in saving the mother instead. I think this makes sense, though not everyone accepts PAC (e.g. Richard, who also posted here, and has an excellent philosophy blog worth reading, tends towards a more totalist view in population ethics).
For what it’s worth, it’s also important to think about the implications that your position here will have on abortion, since any totalist view here has repugnant conclusions there.
It depends on whether you take a person-affecting view or totalist view. On the former, the baby isn’t a person (and won’t be, if you don’t save him/her), and so does not and never will have actual preferences in not dying (since that requires fairly sophisticated views of self over time etc). Hence, despite the fact that saving the baby will achieve comparatively more QALYs, there’s nothing wrong in saving the mother instead. I think this makes sense, though not everyone accepts PAC (e.g. Richard, who also posted here, and has an excellent philosophy blog worth reading, tends towards a more totalist view in population ethics).
For what it’s worth, it’s also important to think about the implications that your position here will have on abortion, since any totalist view here has repugnant conclusions there.