Main description:

This book explores issues surrounding measles and vaccination in Pakistan. Drawing on long-term ethnographic research, it focuses on two major outbreaks in Sindh Province and on Pakistan's vaccination campaigns. The chapters examine the responses to outbreaks and vaccination from various stakeholders including local people, the Pakistani government and the WHO. Inayat Ali reflects on the competing agendas, differing conceptualizations of measles and vaccination, and the factors that lie behind these contestations. Situating outbreaks within the institutionalized form of disparities, he analyzes the rituals used to deal with measles and local resistance to vaccines in Pakistan. The distinct imaginaries and practices related to measles and vaccination are considered in national and global context, and the book makes a valuable contribution to the development of an anthropology of vaccination and medical anthropology of Pakistan.

Contents:

Preface by Merrill Singer

Prologue

Introduction

1 Many Anthropologies: Reflections on Theoretical Threads and the Medical Anthropology of Pakistan

2 Researchlogue: Design, Methodology, and Circumstances of Data collection

3 The Setting: From Sindh Province to the Sindhi Villages

4 Competing Healthcare Systems: Revisiting Medical Pluralism in Pakistan

5 Health and Illness: Socio-cultural Understanding

6 Local Rituals of Containment: Emic Perceptions and Practices around Measles

7 Social Dramas: Two Measles Outbreaks and Multiple Narratives in Pakistan

8 The Critical Geopolitical Events: Making Sense of Anti-Vaccination Sentiment

9 National and Global Rituals of Containment: Controversies, Contestations, and Mistrust Surrounding Vaccination in Pakistan

10 Measles Vaccine: From General to Particular

11 Creating an Anthropology of Vaccination: The International "Anti-Vaxx" Movement and Multiple Narratives

Conclusions: Interrelations between Measle's Sacredness and Systematic Disparities

Epilogue

Bibliography