History of GH + practices and development of policies 1.7-1.8 Flashcards
What is meant by politics of health?
Politics using health
Health is addressed solely for the purposes of achieving political outcomes
What is meant by health politics?
Health using politics
Politics can and should be used to further the goals of global health but use politics as a tool e.g. International conventions
Give a brief timeline of the evolution of Western biomedicine throughout time
Origin - classicists (Ancient Greece + Rome) e.g. Hippocrates, Aristotle, Galen
7th Century - Islamic empires of middle east
15th + 16th Century - Reemergence of medicine in Europe
19th + 20th Century - Empirical techniques + EBM e.g. germ theory and evidence-based medicine
When did the concept of public health emerge?
Mid 19th century
Europe + USA
Social reform movement + growth of medical and biological knowledge
What are the main concepts of public health?
Evidence based medicine/practice
Focus on populations not individuals
Goal of social justice and equity
Prevention not curative
Outline the development of colonial tropical medicine
A period of mercantile, missionary + colonial regimes in 17th century - trade + politics
Imperial interests + development of infrastructure as development was patchy + disorganised
More sinister as power developments occurred
Doctors who came with colonialists had intention of converting religion + cultural beliefs (Victorian societal values)
Why did early tropical medicine focus on communicable diseases?
Because a lot of the diseases e.g. small pox, cholera, TB are associated with poverty
How was colonial tropical medicine justified?
Social Darwinism - Survival of fittest in sociological sense: HIC > LIC
Racialised Paternalism - White, civilised, colonial supremacy
Advance guard for European + American Imperialism
What was the negative response to colonial tropical medicine?
Resistance to modern medicine e.g. Algeria
Knew the medicine worked but became a symbol of coloniser which was the oppressor
What prompted post-Colonial International Medicine?
WW2
Europe devastated afterwards, US helped massively in redeveloping European countries
What 2 things did the US implement to help redevelop Europe after WW2?
Bretton Woods Conference + Agreement 1944
The Marshall Plan 1948 - commitment to social reform; huge money lending operation to Europe + post depression America which changed health
What is vertical programming?
Specific agenda achieved by specific goals
What is horizontal programming?
A more holistic way of addressing health - focus on prevention e.g. decrease child mortality by increasing wealth, nutrition etc
What are the benefits of vertical programming?
Easier to achieve
Cheaper than cross-sector/horizontal approach e.g. MDGs
Focus on individual developing countries
Focus on infectious and tropical diseases, water + sanitation, malnutrition + maternal and child health - bilateral funding + overseas development
What is a global example of vertical programming?
The Global Fund
Multilateral agency = several institutions fund it
Fight AIDS, TB + malaria
Specific, measurable objectives and focus on short-medium term outcomes
Centralised management
What are the problems with vertical programming?
International health - neoliberal view which has severe impacts on social sectors i.e. long term economic growth but at cost of taking away from the poor and increasing wealth gap
Aid - no interest in role of state; corruption, conflict + inhibits social capital + foreign investment
What is neoliberalism?
A philosophical concept whereby everyone should have freedom and favours free-market capitalism e.g. freedom of trade, reformation
E.g. Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) - IMF + World Bank loans
What is the future of global health?
Focus on real partnership = no hidden agenda
Pooling of experience + knowledge to improve health challenges across the world
2 way flow between HIC + LIC
Give an example whereby racial, paternalism occurred in the context of global health
Artemisinin
Used by Chinese herbalists for over 2000 years as Tx for malaria yet in 1967, Chairman Mao had already looked into starting malaria Tx
In 1979, published in Chinese Medical Journal but met globally with skepticism - was effective in treating malaria but toxic in humans
An Oxford professor, Nick White, then became the primary proponent for use of artemisinin + in 2010 received Canadian Gairdner Award for this
Yet Professor Tu Youyou only received her Nobel Prize for the discovery in 2015
Political skepticism due to Cold War + that it came from China
What quote illustrates the problems of colonial medicine?
‘The spread of health risks + diseases across the world, often linked with trade or attempted conquest, is not new to public health or international health.’ Koplan, J, 1993-5
When and how did the development era begin?
1945
Marshall Plan
Bretton Woods Institutions
Truman’s inauguration address in 1949
What 2 key ideas is colonial development based on?
Compatibility of economies
Need for colonies to pay for themselves
What was the dual mandate?
A concept popularised by Lord Lugard (an early colonial administrator)
Different economies would benefit from each other: African + Asian colonies would provide raw materials to European manufacturers + British manufacturers would export goods to colonies
Why did the dual mandate collapse?
Intervention caused anger, protests + non-compliance
Resistance to policies
Fed into nationalist struggles for independence (Colonial development policy sowed the seeds for the failure of colonialism itself)
Could no longer claim to be meeting the needs of Africans - lacked broad support + dual mandate exposed as a myth