Development and Public Health in the Himalaya

This book charts important social and political transitions in Nepal through the lens of medicine. It engages with a range of issues - mission health care institutions, tuberculosis as a sight of ethnographic inquiry and medical intervention, the pharmaceuticalization of mental health and public health, development ideologies and the attempted creation of modern subjects and citizens to advance the health of the nation. Based on two decades of experience, both as a physician and public health professional and an anthropologist, the author presents these issues through four case studies of health programme intervention in Palpa district to show the inter-related aspects of the processes. He explains how local realities align with, resist, and are complicated by globalized narratives and practices of health and development. The book also pays careful attention to traditional healers, infectious disease, micronutrient initiatives, mental health and the historical, ideological, and political-economic context of mission-based development work. It offers a holistic picture of the challenges and possibilities for action that exist in Nepal today, and will be of interest to academics in the field of medical and development anthropology and those working on health and development and global health.