ArticleJournal of medical ethics2024
Is pregnancy a disease? A normative approach.
Article in Journal of medical ethics, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed.
- Ectogenesis, gestational preferences and the social coercion argument.Monash bioethics review · 2026Article
- What is pregnancy and what is disease? a critique of Smajdor and Räsänen's "is pregnancy a disease? a normative approach".Monash bioethics review · 2026Article
- The struggle over caesarean section on maternal request: an ethical principles approach to Swedish media portrayal.Reproductive health · 2025Article
- Pregnancy, pain and pathology: a reply to Smajdor and Räsänen.Journal of medical ethics · 2024Article
- Pregnant women are often not listened to, but pathologising pregnancy isn't the solution.Journal of medical ethics · 2024Article
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2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
In this paper, we identify some key features of what makes something a disease, and consider whether these apply to pregnancy. We argue that there are some compelling grounds for regarding pregnancy as a disease. Like a disease, pregnancy affects the health of the pregnant person, causing a range of symptoms from discomfort to death. Like a disease, pregnancy can be treated medically. Like a disease, pregnancy is caused by a pathogen, an external organism invading the host's body. Like a disease, the risk of getting pregnant can be reduced by using prophylactic measures. We address the question of whether the 'normality' of pregnancy, its current necessity for human survival, or the value often attached to it are reasons to reject the view that pregnancy is a disease. We point out that applying theories of disease to the case of pregnancy, can in many cases illuminate inconsistencies and problems within these theories. Finally, we show that it is difficult to find one theory of disease that captures all paradigm cases of diseases, while convincingly excluding pregnancy. We conclude that there are both normative and pragmatic reasons to consider pregnancy a disease.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.