Approaches to Health and Health Care

Diseases do not naturally respect boundaries. Although their origins may be local, their diffusion often becomes international, borne by trade, war and other modes of human or animal contact. Combatting disease – or promoting health –

is thus an international and a local matter. In the twentieth century inter­national health organizations, both public and private, have greatly influenced the formulation of state health policies throughout the world. The day-to-day practice of health care, however, is carried out at the local level. International and local approaches to health and health care thus interact dynamically, and the relationship is characterized by a variety of tensions. This volume contains a selection of the papers presented at the 2010 Bergen work­shop on the history of health and medicine, organized by the Department of Archeology, History, Cultural Studies and Religion at the University of Bergen.
The contributions discuss the activities of the League of Nations Health Organization and the International Health Division of the Rockefeller Foundation; the role of public health experts in Spain; aspects of health care for the mentally ill in Britain, Germany and Norway; the medical “otherness” of women; and the international and local response to bacterial invasion and colonization.


Content

Astri Andresen, William H. Hubbard and Teemu Ryymin: International and local approaches to health and health care 7

Iris Borowy: The League of Nations Health Organization: from European to global health concerns? 11

Josep L. Barona: Public health experts and scientific authority 31

Volker Roelcke: Changing historiographies and professional identities: Nazi medical atrocities in post-World War II German psychiatry 49

Val Harrington: Learning about mental health services through local histories: case studies from the Manchester region 63

Øyvind Thomassen: Diagnosing the criminal insane in Norway 1895–1915 79

Anne Kveim Lie: Constructing “the other”: menstruation as pathology in Norway 1850–1900 99

Anne Hardy: Us and them: bacterial invasion and colonization in the twentieth century 115

Contributors 130

ISBN 978-82-7099-606-3, 130 pages, paperback
Format: 17x24 cm, weight 0,3 kg, year of publication 2010, language: English