Review of Physicians at War: The Dual-Loyalties Challenge

, Fritz Allhoff, Ed. (Springer, 2008). Reviewed by Michael Davis As a military physician was getting into an ambulance to attend to the wounded at a firefight near Bagdad, a line officer asked her to report by radio any suspicious activity she saw: “The enemy is always setting bombs along that road. The more we spot, the fewer of our guys you’ll have to patch up.” As a member of the military, the physician should, it seems, agree to help protect “our guys”. But, as a physician in a vehicle marked with a red cross, shouldn’t she decline? Physicians are supposed to be physicians, not forward observation posts. Her loyalty to the military seems to clash with her loyalty to her profession. That is the subject of this collection of original essays, the so-called “problem of the dual loyalty of military physicians”.