Alice, a sixty-year-old woman diagnosed with metastatic sarcoma, is undergoing palliative chemotherapy. This has stabilized her disease. However, there is a national shortage of one of the drugs that is part of her current chemotherapy regimen. Given the critical dearth in the supply chain, the hospital has developed an allocation plan to reserve the remaining drug for a select group of patients who will derive the most benefit from it, and who have no viable alternatives. Although Alice has previously used the drug against her cancer with good effect, she does not fulfill the hospital's rationing criteria. Instead, she is offered an alternative medication.Alice does not want to change a regimen that is working for her. She has a friend who is employed at another hospital, and that friend, knowing her concerns, has offered her access to the drug. Alice's friend has obtained the drug legally, and its quality and authenticity are not in question. Alice, now with her own supply of the drug, asks her oncologist to administer it to her at the hospital where he currently treats her.The oncologist is troubled by her request. Should he treat Alice with her own supply of a rationed drug?
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