I just finished Paul Farmer's @PIH @EngagePIH magnum opus Fevers, Feuds, and Diamonds--highly recommend to #MedTwitter #Medstudenttwitter #MedEd #globalhealth #Docswhoread #Medhum @MedBookClub1 @Doctorbookshelf @MedHumChat @SocMedOnAir
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This book embodies the approach of #socialmedicine: a deep/trenchant analysis of the Ebola epidemic from the perspectives of history, politics, economics, culture in addition to epidemiology & infectious disease. Farmer interweaves his perspectives as anthropologist and clinician
We hear perspectives of front-line healthcare workers (local and from NGOs like @PIH ), patients who survived Ebola, and a sweeping history of West Africa demonstrating how centuries of coloniality and extraction set the stage for both Ebola epidemics and the int'l response
Why was it, Farmer asks, that nearly every evacuated expatriate survived Ebola when the mortality was so high in West Africa? Rather than cite 'medical mistrust' why not question the strategy of "containment over care," which offered no treatment/hope, only isolation.
Labs and IV fluids, among the most basic of medical resources, were in many cases all that were needed to cure patients. But they were absent in what Farmer calls "medical deserts" explaining the dramatic differences in Ebola outcome in West Africa vs US/Europe
What's the goal of gory Hollywoodized Ebola narratives if it's a largely treatable disease when basic resources are available? Farmer analyzes the narratives that circulated to 'justify' racist colonial views that led to blame/containment rather than collaboration/care.
In many of these Ebola stories and analyses we could substitute #COVID19 and all would be true. Indeed Farmer discusses parallels between the inequities unmasked by the COVID19 pandemic and those unmasked by Ebola in the preface and epilogue
Highly recommend this book! But, in the immortal words of @levarburton you don't have to take my word for it. Check out @Jamie_Ducharme review in @TIME
time.com
cc: @IshaanKDesai @EngagePIH
time.com
cc: @IshaanKDesai @EngagePIH
A follow up / related read I'm looking forward to is @Real_Ironist Epidemic Illusions, which I learned about on the amazing @SocMedOnAir podcast
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