Naono, Atsuko (Author)
Centaurus: International Magazine of the History of Mathematics, Science, and Technology
Volume: 64
Issue: 1
Pages: 119-132
This article explores the question of how malaria “ends” in Myanmar, since malaria has been categorized both as an epidemic and as being endemic on seemingly countless occasions. The example of malaria reveals some of the limitations of understanding a disease within a single category of experience, such as an “epidemic.” In the case of malaria, epidemic is a shifting term that is best understood as being the point at which health authorities decide to intervene in the disease, rather than as a clear and absolute measure of the scale or intensity of the threat. The identification of malaria as epidemic may thus be better understood as a political choice rather than as a precisely defined medical category. This article thus discusses what it means to end malaria in Myanmar, what kind of ending has been envisaged, and by whom. As this article demonstrates, policy makers have at various points aimed for the “elimination,” “eradication,” and “control” of malaria. Unlike the local population, who seem to have a rather nonchalant attitude toward malaria since malaria has long been familiar to them, international partners and the government have been shaping the narrative toward elimination with the aim of obtaining the World Health Organization's malaria-free certificate. Despite a number of political, social, and environmental obstacles, they believe that elimination can be achieved by 2030. However, unexpected political events such as the military coup in 2021, as well as the emergence of another pandemic, demonstrates that the “end” of malaria is a fragile concept.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Book
Andrew Lakoff;
(2017)
Unprepared: Global Health in a Time of Emergency
(/isis/citation/CBB434578273/)
Article
Jones, Margaret;
(2013)
A “Textbook Pattern”? Malaria Control and Eradication in Jamaica, 1910--65
(/isis/citation/CBB001320597/)
Article
Florence Bretelle‐Establet;
(2020)
Science, Demons, and Gods in the Battle Against the COVID-19 Epidemic
(/isis/citation/CBB540072063/)
Book
Jean-Paul Gaudillière;
Claire Beaudevin;
Christoph Gradmann;
Anne M. Lovell;
Laurent Pordié;
David Cantor;
(2020)
Global health and the new world order: Historical and anthropological approaches to a changing regime of governance
(/isis/citation/CBB020942143/)
Article
Shane Doyle;
(2020)
Pandemics and soft power: HIV/AIDS and Uganda on the global stage
(/isis/citation/CBB512383773/)
Article
Jones, M.;
(2000)
The Ceylon malaria epidemic of 1934--35: A case study in colonial medicine
(/isis/citation/CBB000111976/)
Article
Kitchens, Carl;
(2013)
A Dam Problem: TVA's Fight against Malaria, 1926--1951
(/isis/citation/CBB001450377/)
Article
Carter, Eric D.;
(2009)
“God Bless General Perón”: DDT and the Endgame of Malaria Eradication in Argentina in the 1940s
(/isis/citation/CBB000930499/)
Book
Livingston, Julie;
(2012)
Improvising Medicine: An African Oncology Ward in an Emerging Cancer Epidemic
(/isis/citation/CBB001420179/)
Article
Chiffoleau, Sylvia;
(2013)
Entre bienfaisance, contrôle des populations et agenda international: la politique sanitaire du mandat français en Syrie et au Liban
(/isis/citation/CBB001213546/)
Book
Dóra Vargha;
(2018)
Polio Across the Iron Curtain: Hungary's Cold War with an Epidemic
(/isis/citation/CBB820799463/)
Book
Ulysses B. Panisset;
(2000)
International Health Statecraft: Foreign Policy and Public Health in Peru's Cholera Epidemic
(/isis/citation/CBB337527752/)
Book
Alan Whiteside;
(2017)
HIV & AIDS: A Very Short Introduction
(/isis/citation/CBB155086702/)
Article
Virginia Berridge;
(2022)
The Many Endings of Recent Epidemics: HIV/AIDS, Swine Flu 2009, and Policy
(/isis/citation/CBB473200788/)
Book
Jean-Paul Gaudillière;
Andrew McDowell;
Claudia Lang;
Claire Beaudevin;
(2022)
Global Health for All: Knowledge, Politics, and Practices
(/isis/citation/CBB132172717/)
Article
Jenkins, Jane E.;
(2007)
Baptism of Fire: New Brunswick's Public Health Movement and the 1918 Influenza Epidemic
(/isis/citation/CBB000900123/)
Article
Breyfogle, Nicholas B.;
Brooke, John L.;
Otter, Christopher J.;
(2013)
The State and the Epidemiological Transition: An Introduction
(/isis/citation/CBB001201440/)
Chapter
David Reubi;
(2021)
Pathologies of Modernisation: Epidemiological Imaginaries and the Smoking Epidemic in Postcolonial Africa
(/isis/citation/CBB905636585/)
Article
Angela Ki Che Leung;
(2020)
Chinese State and Society in Epidemic Governance: A Historical Perspective
(/isis/citation/CBB309216124/)
Book
Fidler, David P.;
(2004)
SARS: Governance and the Globalization of Disease
(/isis/citation/CBB000771250/)
Canadian Bulletin of Medical History/Bulletin Canadienne d'Histoire de la Medecine
Journal of Economic History
Journal of Global History
Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences
Journal of World History
Be the first to comment!