Download or read book The Political Life of an Epidemic written by Simukai Chigudu and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-30 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reveals how the crisis of Zimbabwe's cholera outbreak of 2008-9 had profound implications for political institutions and citizenship.
Download or read book The Politics of Fear written by Michiel Hofman and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017-01-05 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 2014-2015 Ebola epidemic in West Africa was an unprecedented medical and political emergency that cast an unflattering light on multiple corners of government and international response. Fear, not rational planning, appeared to drive many decisions made at population and leadership levels, which in turn brought about a response that was as uneven as it was unprecedented: entire populations were decimated or destroyed, vaccine trials were fast-tracked, health staff died, untested medications were used (or not used) in controversial ways, humanitarian workers returned home to enforced isolation, and military was employed to sometimes disturbing ends. The epidemic revealed serious fault lines at all levels of theory and practice of global public health: national governments were shown to be helpless and unprepared for calamity at this scale; the World Health Organization was roundly condemned for its ineffectiveness; the US quietly created its own African CDC a year after the epidemic began. Amid such chaos, Médecins sans Frontières was forced to act with unprecdented autonomy -- and amid great criticism -- in responding to the disease, taking unprecedented steps in deploying services and advocating for international aid. The Politics of Fear provides a primary documentary resource for recounting and learning from the Ebola epidemic. Comprising eleven topic-based chapters and four eyewitness vignettes from both MSF- and non-MSF-affiliated contributors (all of whom have been given access to MSF Ebola archives from Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia for research), it aims to provide a politically agnostic account of the defining health event of the 21st century so far, one that will hopefully inform current opinions and future responses.
Download or read book Where Are We Now written by Giorgio Agamben and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2021-04-30 with total page 105 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Renowned Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben presents his fierce, passionate, and deeply personal commentaries regarding the 2020 health emergency as it played out in Italy and across the world. Alongside and beyond accusations, these texts reflect upon the great transformation affecting Western democracies. In the name of biosecurity and health, the model of bourgeois democracy—together with its rights, institutions, and constitutions—is surrendering everywhere to a new despotism where citizens accept unprecedented limitations to their freedoms. The push to accept this new normal leads to the urgency of the volume’s title: Where Are We Now? For how long will we accept living in a constantly extended state of exception, the end of which remains impossible to see?
Download or read book Epidemic City written by James Colgrove and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2011-05-05 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An insightful chronicle of the changing public health demands in New York City. The first permanent Board of Health in the United States was created in response to a cholera outbreak in New York City in 1866. By the mid-twentieth century, thanks to landmark achievements in vaccinations, medical data collection, and community health, the NYC Department of Health had become the nation's gold standard for public health. However, as the city's population grew in number and diversity, the department struggled to balance its efforts between the treatment of diseases—such as AIDS, tuberculosis, and West Nile Virus—and the prevention of illness-causing factors like lead paint, heroin addiction, homelessness, smoking, and unhealthy foods. In Epidemic City, historian of public health James Colgrove chronicles the challenges faced by the health department since New York City's mid-twentieth-century "peak" in public health provision. This insightful volume draws on archival research and oral histories to examine how the provision of public health has adapted to the competing demands of diverse public needs, public perceptions, and political pressure. Epidemic City analyzes the perspectives and efforts of the people responsible for the city's public health from the 1960s to the present—a time that brought new challenges, such as budget and staffing shortages, and new threats like bioterrorism. Faced with controversies such as needle exchange programs and AIDS reporting, the health department struggled to maintain a delicate balance between its primary focus on illness prevention and the need to ensure public and political support for its activities. In the past decade, after the 9/11 attacks and bioterrorism scares partially diverted public health efforts from illness prevention to threat response, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden were still able to pass New York's Clean Indoor Air Act restricting smoking and significant regulations on trans-fats used by restaurants. This legislation—preventative in nature much like the department's original sanitary code—reflects a return to the nineteenth century roots of public health, when public health measures were often overtly paternalistic. The assertive laws conceived by Frieden and executed by Bloomberg demonstrate how far the mandate of public health can extend when backed by committed government officials. Epidemic City provides a compelling historical analysis of the individuals and groups tasked with negotiating the fine line between public health and political considerations. By examining the department's successes and failures during the ambitious social programs of the 1960s, the fiscal crisis of the 1970s, the struggles with poverty and homelessness in the 1980s and 1990s, and in the post-9/11 era, Epidemic City shows how the NYC Department of Health has defined the role and scope of public health services for the entire nation.
Download or read book And The Band Played on written by Randy Shilts and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2000-04-09 with total page 666 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An investigative account of the medical, sexual, and scientific questions surrounding the spread of AIDS across the country.
Download or read book Epidemics and Society written by Frank M. Snowden and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2019-10-22 with total page 603 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A wide-ranging study that illuminates the connection between epidemic diseases and societal change, from the Black Death to Ebola This sweeping exploration of the impact of epidemic diseases looks at how mass infectious outbreaks have shaped society, from the Black Death to today. In a clear and accessible style, Frank M. Snowden reveals the ways that diseases have not only influenced medical science and public health, but also transformed the arts, religion, intellectual history, and warfare. A multidisciplinary and comparative investigation of the medical and social history of the major epidemics, this volume touches on themes such as the evolution of medical therapy, plague literature, poverty, the environment, and mass hysteria. In addition to providing historical perspective on diseases such as smallpox, cholera, and tuberculosis, Snowden examines the fallout from recent epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, SARS, and Ebola and the question of the world’s preparedness for the next generation of diseases.
Download or read book Healing Politics written by Abdul El-Sayed and published by Abrams. This book was released on 2020-03-31 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A memoir about restoring the health of our people, and our democracy, from a physician and “one of the brightest young stars” of the progressive movement (Sen. Bernie Sanders). A child of immigrants, Abdul El-Sayed grew up feeling a responsibility to help others. He threw himself into the study of medicine and excelled—winning a Rhodes Scholarship, earning two advanced degrees, and landing a tenure-track position at Columbia University. At thirty, he became the youngest city health official in America, tasked with rebuilding Detroit’s health department after years of austerity policies. But El-Sayed found himself disillusioned. He could heal the sick—even build healthier, safer communities—but that wouldn’t address the social and economic conditions causing illness in the first place. So he left health for politics, running for Governor of Michigan and earning the support of progressive champions like Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Bernie Sanders. This memoir traces the life of a young idealist, weaving together powerful personal stories and fascinating forays into history and science. Marrying his unique perspective with the science of epidemiology, El-Sayed diagnoses an underlying epidemic afflicting our country, an epidemic of insecurity. And to heal the rifts this epidemic has created, he lays out a new direction for the progressive movement. This is a bold, personal, and compellingly original book from a prominent young leader. “In Healing Politics, Abdul El-Sayed doesn’t just diagnose the causes of our broken politics; he gives us a prescription and treatment plan.” —Representative Pramila Jayapal
Download or read book Learning from SARS written by Institute of Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2004-04-26 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in late 2002 and 2003 challenged the global public health community to confront a novel epidemic that spread rapidly from its origins in southern China until it had reached more than 25 other countries within a matter of months. In addition to the number of patients infected with the SARS virus, the disease had profound economic and political repercussions in many of the affected regions. Recent reports of isolated new SARS cases and a fear that the disease could reemerge and spread have put public health officials on high alert for any indications of possible new outbreaks. This report examines the response to SARS by public health systems in individual countries, the biology of the SARS coronavirus and related coronaviruses in animals, the economic and political fallout of the SARS epidemic, quarantine law and other public health measures that apply to combating infectious diseases, and the role of international organizations and scientific cooperation in halting the spread of SARS. The report provides an illuminating survey of findings from the epidemic, along with an assessment of what might be needed in order to contain any future outbreaks of SARS or other emerging infections.
Download or read book A Nation of Takers written by Nicholas Eberstadt and published by Templeton Foundation Press. This book was released on 2012-10-10 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In A Nation of Takers: America’s Entitlement Epidemic, one of our country’s foremost demographers, Nicholas Eberstadt, details the exponential growth in entitlement spending over the past fifty years. As he notes, in 1960, entitlement payments accounted for well under a third of the federal government’s total outlays. Today, entitlement spending accounts for a full two-thirds of the federal budget. Drawing on an impressive array of data and employing a range of easy-to-read, four-color charts, Eberstadt shows the unchecked spiral of spending on a range of entitlements, everything from Medicare to disability payments. But Eberstadt does not just chart the astonishing growth of entitlement spending, he also details the enormous economic and cultural costs of this epidemic. He powerfully argues that while this spending certainly drains our federal coffers, it also has a very real, long-lasting, negative impact on the character of our citizens. Also included in the book is a response from one of our leading political theorists, William Galston. In his incisive response, he questions Eberstadt’s conclusions about the corrosive effect of entitlements on character and offers his own analysis of the impact of American entitlement growth.
Download or read book Epidemics written by Sarah Dry and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-09-23 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent disease events such as SARS, H1N1 and avian influenza, and haemorrhagic fevers have focussed policy and public concern as never before on epidemics and so-called 'emerging infectious diseases'. Understanding and responding to these often unpredictable events have become major challenges for local, national and international bodies. All too often, responses can become restricted by implicit assumptions about who or what is to blame that may not capture the dynamics and uncertainties at play in the multi-scale interactions of people, animals and microbes. As a result, policies intended to forestall epidemics may fail, and may even further threaten health, livelihoods and human rights. The book takes a unique approach by focusing on how different policy-makers, scientists, and local populations construct alternative narratives-accounts of the causes and appropriate responses to outbreaks- about epidemics at the global, national and local level. The contrast between emergency-oriented, top-down responses to what are perceived as potentially global outbreaks and longer-term approaches to diseases, such as AIDS, which may now be considered endemic, is highlighted. Case studies-on avian influenza, SARS, obesity, H1N1 influenza, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and haemorrhagic fevers-cover a broad historical, geographical and biological range. As this book explores, it is often the most vulnerable members of a population-the poor, the social excluded and the already ill-who are likely to suffer most from epidemic diseases. At the same time, they may be less likely to benefit from responses that may be designed from a global perspective that neglects social, ecological and political conditions on the ground. This book aims to bring the focus back to these marginal populations to reveal the often unintended consequences of current policy responses to epidemics. Important implications emerge - for how epidemics are thought about and represented; for how surveillance and response is designed; and for whose knowledge and perspectives should be included. Published in association with the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
Download or read book AIDS and Power written by Alex de Waal and published by Zed Books Ltd.. This book was released on 2013-04-04 with total page 134 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One in six adults in sub-Saharan Africa will die in their prime of AIDS. It is a stunning cataclysm, plunging life expectancy to pre-modern levels and orphaning millions of children. Yet political trauma does not grip Africa. People living with AIDS are not rioting in the streets or overthrowing governments. In fact, democratic governance is spreading. Contrary to fearful predictions, the social fabric is not being ripped apart by bands of unsocialized orphan children. AIDS and Power explains why social and political life in Africa goes on in a remarkably normal way, and how political leaders have successfully managed the AIDS epidemic so as to overcome any threats to their power. Partly because of pervasive denial, AIDS is not a political priority for electorates, and therefore not for democratic leaders either. AIDS activists have not directly challenged the political order, instead using international networks to promote a rights-based approach to tackling the epidemic. African political systems have proven resilient in the face of AIDS's stresses, and rulers have learned to co-opt international AIDS efforts to their own political ends. In contrast with these successes, African governments and international agencies have a sorry record of tackling the epidemic itself. AIDS and Power concludes without political incentives for HIV prevention, this failure will persist.
Download or read book Coronavirus Politics written by Scott L Greer and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2021-04-19 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: COVID-19 is the most significant global crisis of any of our lifetimes. The numbers have been stupefying, whether of infection and mortality, the scale of public health measures, or the economic consequences of shutdown. Coronavirus Politics identifies key threads in the global comparative discussion that continue to shed light on COVID-19 and shape debates about what it means for scholarship in health and comparative politics. Editors Scott L. Greer, Elizabeth J. King, Elize Massard da Fonseca, and André Peralta-Santos bring together over 30 authors versed in politics and the health issues in order to understand the health policy decisions, the public health interventions, the social policy decisions, their interactions, and the reasons. The book’s coverage is global, with a wide range of key and exemplary countries, and contains a mixture of comparative, thematic, and templated country studies. All go beyond reporting and monitoring to develop explanations that draw on the authors' expertise while engaging in structured conversations across the book.
Download or read book Understanding West Africa s Ebola Epidemic written by Ibrahim Abdullah and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2017-10-15 with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From 2013 to 2015, over 11,000 people across West Africa lost their lives to the deadliest outbreak of the Ebola virus in history. Crucially, this epidemic marked the first time the virus was able to spread beyond rural areas to major cities, overturning conventional assumptions about its epidemiology. With backgrounds ranging from development to disease control, the contributors to this volume - some of them based in countries affected by the Ebola epidemic - consider the underlying factors that shaped this unprecedented outbreak. While championing the heroic efforts of local communities and aid workers in halting the spread of the disease, the contributors also reveal deep structural problems in both the countries and humanitarian agencies involved, which hampered the efforts to contain the epidemic. Alarmingly, they show that little has been learned from these events, with health provision remaining underfunded and poorly equipped to deal with future outbreaks. Such issues, they argue, reflect the wider challenges we face in tackling epidemic disease in an increasingly interconnected world.
Download or read book Epidemics and Ideas written by Terence Ranger and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1992 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From plague to AIDS, epidemics have been the most spectacular diseases to afflict human societies. This volume examines the way in which these great crises have influenced ideas, how they have helped to shape theological, political and social thought, and how they have been interpreted and understood in the intellectual context of their time.
Download or read book The Anthropology of Epidemics written by Ann H. Kelly and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-01-15 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the past decades, infectious disease epidemics have come to increasingly pose major global health challenges to humanity. The Anthropology of Epidemics approaches epidemics as total social phenomena: processes and events which encompass and exercise a transformational impact on social life whilst at the same time functioning as catalysts of shifts and ruptures as regards human/non-human relations. Bearing a particular mark on subject areas and questions which have recently come to shape developments in anthropological thinking, the volume brings epidemics to the forefront of anthropological debate, as an exemplary arena for social scientific study and analysis.
Download or read book Epidemic City written by James Keith Colgrove and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Epidemic City written by James Keith Colgrove and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
