Are numbers still killing people: And what is being done about it?

There is increasing recourse to quantitative approaches in healthcare allocation and prioritisation, frequently using methods from operational research and health economics. Such approaches can prove very attractive and influential, employing what are viewed as scientific, rational, methods. But can high-tech quantitative analysis, taken to its apparently logical conclusion, cause the ethical ‘human’ dimension in health care to be overridden. This paper develops some of the ethics arguments posed in an earlier paper by Mullen and Mullen (2006), questioning whether it is ever permissible to kill someone. It then suggests why numbers might kill and discusses what might prevent this. Some recent developments are then reviewed to address the question of whether “Killing by Numbers” has become more or less likely. It is concluded that, despite recent developments, the attraction of apparently logical quantitative approaches means that numbers probably are still killing people.