Public Health Education and Campaigns in China, 1910-1990

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This project will produce the first comprehensive and analytical book about public health education and campaigns in twentieth-century China. The study examines the various national public health movements conducted by private groups and different regimes over eight decades. It analyzes the diverse public health concerns that were tied to China's revolutions, agrarian reforms, economic productivity, and even military engagements at different times. The project investigates key important issues in the public health movements, such as public health and modernization, the dominance of scientific knowledge of medicine in public health education, the challenge of transmitting scientific knowledge of health and diseases to a large population with high illiteracy rate, and the tension between traditional Chinese medicine and modern Western medicine in public health programs. The study also examines how health campaigns contributed to the elimination and reduction of epidemic diseases. The book has seven chapters that discuss (1) pioneering groups in public health education, (2) the ascendance of scientific knowledge of medicine and health in China, (3) the experiment of community-based health demonstration stations, (4) politicization of public health movements and maximization of methods for the prevention of diseases, (5) rural health reform and agrarian transformation, (6) maternal and child health care and education, and (7) transition to market economy and new challenges to public health. This study shows that public health was integral to modern nation-building. The project draws on extensive research I have conducted at more than ten major archival institutions and libraries in the United States, the United Kingdom, and China. Primary sources include archival documents and statistical information, oral history, and visual materials of posters, photos, and medical advertisement. The dissemination of health knowledge and the change in health-related behavior in China brought about by the public health campaigns offer useful lessons for many nations, including China today.