Underbelly - Childhood Diarrhea and the Hidden Local Realities of Global Health

An unsettling exploration of the hidden power dynamics of global health, seen through the lens of childhood diarrhea and its treatment within the Guatemalan context. Deaths from childhood diarrhea seem preposterous in high-income countries. Yet, for children under five years old in the rest of the world, diarrhea is the third highest cause of mortality. Despite a glut of prevention and treatment programming spanning more than 40 years, this least glamorous of global health ills remains a critical problem. In Guatemala has a fragmented health system, the author explains, that guarantees health as a human right but also suffers from systemic racism, inadequate health services and access to those services, community distrust from a legacy of harm and violence, and a demeaning paternalism. Bringing together the discourses of global health and medical anthropology, With a foreword written by Waleska López Canu, an Indigenous Maya medical director, this book underscores the importance of looking deeper into what seems on its surface incontrovertibly “good” to understand the more complex realities on the ground and in people’s lives....

Product details

• Authors: Waleska Lopez Canu, Rachel Hall-Clifford, Hall-Clifford Rachel, Arthur Kleinman, Kleinman Arthur
• Publisher: The MIT Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 14.05.2024
• EAN: 9780262547765
• ISBN: 978-0-262-54776-5
• No. of pages: 282
• Dimensions: 152 mm x 229 mm x 20 mm
• Subjects: Natural sciences, medicine, IT, technology > Medicine > General; MEDICAL / Public Health, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Physical, Public health and preventive medicine, Nursing & ancillary services, POLITICAL SCIENCE / Public Policy / Health Care