MINNEAPOLIS, April 8, 2008—Is health care a right or a privilege? If it is a right, what limits, if any, can be imposed on individuals for the sake of the population's health? Minnesota State University-Mankato Professor of Nursing Sue Ellen Bell will examine these questions and others during a lecture at St. Olaf College April 9 that will focus on social justice and the health-care industry.

The lecture will begin at 7 p.m. in Buntrock Commons' Viking Theater. It is free and open to the public. Bell's presentation is sponsored by the St. Olaf Nursing Department's Marie Swelland Gross lecture series, which aims to elucidate the interconnection between ethics and medicine.

Bell is an advocate for social justice and the right to health care for all citizens, and she has an interest in the ethics of allocating scarce resources to promote the health of the public. Bell is specifically interested in who gets health care and why. She believes societal duty and good medical practice are inextricable from one another, and she notes that today's college students will need to make important policy decisions regarding health care in the near future.

"Social justice is important to college students since decisions made in this area will influence not only the direct health care that they and their families will receive, but also the costs of that care," Bell says. "Health-care costs are being transferred to the individual and family and are unsustainable in the long term. Students need to make informed decisions about future health-care planning in this country."

Bell teaches primarily in the master's degree and the Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) programs at Minnesota State University-Mankato. As part of that work, she teaches a master's-level ethics course to nurses who are studying to become family nurse practitioners or clinical nurse specialists.

In addition to teaching, Bell is a clinical nurse specialist in community and public health nursing, and she has also been a volunteer for migrant health projects. She also is currently conducting research on the social justice orientation of public health nurses and how this orientation translates into practice.