The political economy of the introduction of Western medicine in India and preexisting health practices.
In India, by the second century B.C., Ayurvedic medicine had already taken the momentous step of becoming rational therapeutics. Physicians created a methodology based on the supreme importance of direct observation of natural phenomena and the technique of rational processing of empirical data. However, over the long history of the country, Ayurvedic medicine underwent severe erosion of its knowledge and practice because of profound political, cultural, social, and economic changes. Nevertheless, it was used by the poor because access to Western medicine was denied by the ruling classes. Alarm bells started to ring with the declaration of self-reliance and self-determination by the poor at Alma-Ata in 1978. A syndicate of the rich countries, with active support of India's ruling elite, mobilized the enormous influence and resources of organizations such as the International Monetary Fund, World Health Organization, UNICEF, and World Bank to promote their unconcealed agenda of promoting the private health sector and further decimating the public sector.
Banerji
Debabar
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Centre for Social Medicine and Community Health, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. nhpp@airtelmail.in
D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000379:methods*; D007194:India; D008515:Medicine, Ayurvedic; D011057:Politics; D015980:Public Health Practice; D012922:Social Change; D019366:Western World