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Analysis of Medical Anthropology’s Relation with Etiology

The field of anthropology is vast and changing, and its many branches and subdivisions

of work encompass a large variety of subjects. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic that the

world is facing, now more-than-ever, I am incredibly interested in the topic of infectious

diseases; more specifically, I am intrigued about the field of medical anthropology and its

relationship with diseases. The curiosity I have towards the topic encouraged me to research it,

and this paper will further explore my study of medical anthropology's connection to etiology

through three different subsets: disease control, inequality’s correlation to disease, and the impact

that social behavior has on infectious diseases. These three aspects are not the only

representation of the roles that medical anthropology plays in relation to disease, but they are

very prominent amongst others in displaying its connection.

The first role that medical anthropology has regarding infectious diseases is through its

control. The vast importance of medical anthropology in controlling the spread of diseases can

be identified into three separate subcategories: belief/knowledge, detection, and

prevention/control. Within the division of belief and knowledge, the job of medical

anthropologists in combatting and understanding infectious disease is to replace false knowledge

and cultural belief with accurate knowledge; additionally, they are also responsible with the

documentation of the beliefs, behaviors, and knowledge of populations (Manderson 1998:

1020-1021). The significance of these tasks are to understand why members of populations think

like they do and the reasoning behind their actions, in attempts to eliminate diseases found in

their environments, allowing anthropologists to study the origin of diseases, as well as reteach
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populations correct behaviors and information to override incorrect beliefs. In the area of

detection, research on diarrhoea, ARI, and malaria was conducted to convey that preemptive

diagnosis is important in the prevention of diseases spreading (Manderson 1998: 1022). Due to

this, another key aspect of medical anthropologists in stopping disease is through the detection.

Pneumonia, in example, has been found to be useful in the study of detection, as information

about its early symptoms has been able to have been disseminated towards various populations;

knowledge about coughing being a primary symptom has become more widespread and utilized,

allowing for faster detection (Manderson 1998: 1022). These findings prove that the faster

uncovering of diseases within communities can contribute to reducing the spread of disease and

the production of treatments to it. In the region of control and prevention efforts, medical

anthropologist’s ability to contain infectious diseases is complicated by a number of factors such

as environmental, structural, infrastructural, financial, and behavioral barriers (Manderson 1998:

1022-1023). In conjunction to these barriers, the willingness of the people of the region is

another impact of the effectiveness of the community to combat the disease. In instances of the

opisthorchis viverrini parasite in Thailand and Laos, prevention/containment was ineffective due

to the repeated consumption of the fish/snails that spread the parasite within the community,

even after being informed of its potential dangers (Manderson 1998: 1023). The significance of

these findings, in coordination with information about detection, belief, and behavior, conveys

that once a disease has been detected, controlling it is limited by the willingness of the people in

conjunction with the resources and barriers available.

Alongside disease control, the second important factor of medical anthropology’s

relationship with infectious diseases is inequality’s correlation to infectious diseases. Besides

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understanding prevention and control, medical anthropology also attempts to analyze the factors

behind why disease is able to manifest itself so quickly and move throughout populations

through underlying social constructs (Nguyen and Peschard 2003: 446-447). Of such social

constructs, inequality in communities is identified as the most prominent factor affecting the

spread of disease. This inequality not only refers to a hierarchical differentiation between

members of a population, but the vast contrast of socioeconomic opportunities and standing as

well (Nguyen and Peschard 2003: 450-451). To understand a small portion of the broad topic of

inequality in our postmodern world, it is broken down into two different regions, of which being:

poverty and social determinants of health (Nguyen and Peschard 2003: 449-458). The first and

most salient factor of inequality, and inherently of spreading disease, is poverty; this is because

the impoverished within communities are malnourished and have weaker immune systems, as

well as living in incompatible and proximally close living conditions (Nguyen and Peschard

2003: 449). In addition to malnourishment and improper living conditions, research has linked

inequality to the development of psychosocial aspects, such as environmental/physical stress,

which leads to an increased susceptibility towards infectious diseases due to increased cortisol

levels (Nguyen and Peschard 2003: 451). In conjunction with disease, social cohesion (i.e. social

ties and networks) has been attributed to inequality’s relationship to disease, as increased social

cohesion has been observed by members of communities of higher social/economic standing,

and less by those that are impoverished; the availability of social networks is correlative with

better health conditions (Nguyen and Peschard 2003: 451). Understanding poverty’s correlation

to inequality and disease is essential to addressing human behavior and values, allowing

researchers to designate better approaches to combating disease; this comprehension also

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acknowledges that improving the quality of life of impoverished members of a community is

also beneficial for the general well-being/health of the global community.

The third and final integral aspect of apprehending medical anthropology’s role in disease

is through the analysis of the spread of disease as a reflection of social behavior. As with

inequality’s tie to disease, understanding social behavior can be better understood broken down

into three separate categories: economic impact in relation to disease spread, cultural belief and

social behavior in relation to disease, and changing social behavior (Inhorn and Brown 1990:

103-107). Economic impact in relation to disease spread very closely relates to the previous

categories of inequality and disease prevention, but contains the portion that neither has, which is

the social behaviors displayed by the affected individual that help contribute to the dissemination

of disease. In example, it is noted that in the case of the HIV/Aids epidemic around the world, in

places such as Sub-Saharan Africa, young men from developing areas that are economically and

politically affected are prime agents of spreading disease; their migration areas to cities due to

inequality of economic opportunities leads to interactions with brothels and prostitutes, allowing

for disease to be spread within cities and in the areas the young men return to (Inhorn and Brown

1990: 103). The significance of this is that social behavior is influenced by economic factors that

dictate the actions and opportunities of inhabitants of specific areas, making individuals affected

prime incubators and transmitters of infectious diseases. Social behavior and the effect that

cultural belief has on the prevention and spread of disease is another important facet of

understanding medical anthropology’s connection to disease. Cultural values about pollution and

hygiene play an essential role in shaping behaviors regarding infection prevention and treatment,

as cultural views held by populations that oppose scientific research can halt the elimination
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from diseases in areas. (Manderson 1998: 1023). In example of the water-borne disease called

dracunculiasis that is found in countries such as Ghana and Nigeria, cultural belief was that it

was not preventable and attributed spread to gods or hereditary disease, impeding the success of

the populations’ knowledge/control of the parasite (Inhorn and Brown 1990: 104-105). These

findings, in conjunction with analyzing influences of social behavior and the impact that cultural

belief has on prevention/control of diseases, prompts the question of how social behavior can be

changed. One way that medical anthropologists assist in this matter is to act as cultural

interpreters through infectious disease control programs to demonstrate the validity, safety, and

success of the remedies that are being introduced to the populations of the area in hopes of

inspiring change of the repeating actions that individuals partake in (Inhorn and Brown 1990:

106-108). However, the effectiveness of these programs and the spread of disease has been

shown to only be as successful as the understanding and willingness of the affected communities.

In example of the cholera vaccination introduced to an area in China in the 1940s, the villagers

had magical/religious ideas counterintuitive to the scientific information discovered about the

prevention and cause of the outbreak, refusing to take the injection, hindering the elimination of

the disease from the area (Inhorn and Brown 1990: 107). The significance of these findings is

that the cultural beliefs of individuals of a population and their subsequent actions are essential

in the stoppage and control of infectious diseases.

Medical anthropology has a deep and complicated connection to the field of etiology, and

it plays a large role in analyzing the causes and prevention of infectious diseases. Specifically,

the control and prevention of disease, understanding the correlation between inequality and

infectious diseases, and the social behavior’s impact on the migration of infectious diseases are
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prominent categories that medical anthropology is a part of. My research has allowed me to

discover so much more about the critical role that medical anthropology plays in combatting and

understanding disease, and my goal of this paper is to inform others of the lessons that can be

learned from other populations that have encountered infectious diseases in the past. Observable

constructs in today’s current climate dealing with the COVID-19 virus, such as inequality, are

very much apparent, as poorer individuals of countries such as the United States are still forced

to work and risk exposure to infection, while wealthier members are able to quarantine/work

from home. Due to this, governments of the world need to work with scientists, including

medical anthropologists, to develop better systems that not only prevent infectious diseases such

as COVID-19 from occurring in the first place, as well as being able to rectify the

injustices/inequalities that disadvantaged members of populations are facing as well in attempts

to control disease growth/spread.

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Bibliography

Inhorn, Marcia & Peter Brown.

1990 The Anthropology of Infectious Disease.

Annual Review of Anthropology 19: 89-117.

Manderson, Lenore.

1998 Applying medical anthropology in the control of infectious disease.

Tropical Medicine & International Health, 3: 1020-1027.

Nguyen, Vinh-Kim & Karine Peschard.

2003 Anthropology, Inequality, and Disease: A Review.

Annual Review of Anthropology 32:1, 447-474.