The Good Doctor and the Medical Care of Children.

This essay will be concerned with the question: must a good doctor also be a good person? More precisely, the question is: does the conception of what it takes to be a good doctor include as part of its meaning the requirement that he or she also be a morally good person? One can imagine asking the same sort of question about other roles or relationships: for example, does one need to be a morally good person to be a good friend, a good parent, a good child, a good judge, a good minister, or a good counselor? In the case of, say, a good chess player the answer would, of course, be NO. A person could be a good chess player but a thoroughly immoral person. As far as the others are concerned, the answer is more problematic. Such is the case of the good doctor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]