Learning Objectives
19.1. The Sociology of the Body and Health
- Examine the relationship between the body and society.
- Understand the term biopolitics as a relationship between the body and modern forms of power.
- Understand how medical sociology describes illness and health as social and cultural constructions.
- Define the field of social epidemiology.
- Understand how health issues are affected by the global distribution of wealth.
- Understand how social epidemiology can be applied to the distribution of health outcomes in Canada.
- Explain disparities of health based on gender, socioeconomic status, race, and ethnicity.
- Give an overview of mental health and disability issues in Canada.
- Explain the terms stigma and medicalization.
19.4. Theoretical Perspectives on Health and Medicine
- Apply functionalist, critical, and symbolic interactionist perspectives to health issues.
Introduction to Health and Medicine
In 2012, a pertussis (whooping cough) outbreak in B.C., Alberta, Ontario, and New Brunswick sickened 2,000 people and resulted in an infant death in Lethbridge. In the United States, where there were 18,000 cases and nine deaths, it was the worst outbreak in 65 years (Picard, 2012). Researchers, suspecting that the primary cause of the outbreak was the waning strength of pertussis vaccines in older children, recommended a booster vaccination for 11–12-year-olds and pregnant women (Zacharyczuk, 2011). Pertussis is most serious for babies; one in five must be hospitalized, and since they are too young for the vaccine themselves, it is crucial that people around them be immunized (Centers for Disease Control 2011). In response to the outbreak, health authorities in various parts of Canada offered free vaccination clinics for parents with infants under one. Typically Canadian children are vaccinated for whooping cough, diphtheria, and tetanus (a combined vaccine known as DTaP) at ages 2, 4, 6, and 18 months, and then again at ages 4 to 6 years and 14 to 16 years (Picard, 2012).
But what of people who do not want their children to have this vaccine, or any other? That question is at the heart of a debate that has been simmering for years. Vaccines are biological preparations that improve immunity against a certain disease. Vaccines have contributed to the eradication and weakening of numerous infectious diseases in human populations, including smallpox, polio, mumps, chicken pox, and meningitis.
However, many people express concern about potential negative side effects from vaccines. These concerns range from fears about overloading the child’s immune system to controversial reports about devastating side effects of the vaccines. One misapprehension is that the vaccine itself might cause the disease it is supposed to be immunizing. Another commonly circulated concern is that vaccinations, specifically the MMR vaccine (MMR stands for measles, mumps, and rubella), are linked to autism.
The autism connection has been particularly controv