Health Policy in a Time of Crisis: Abortion, Austerity, and Access

ISBN-13: 9781629583655 / Angielski / Miękka / 2017 / 190 str.

Bayla Ostrach

Opis

Health Policy in a Time of Crisis is a vivid ethnographic account of women navigating the Catalan health system to access publicly funded abortion care. Situating their access in the context of austerity and threats to recently liberalized abortion laws, the book examines the actual level of access, disparities in access between communities, and the diverse approaches adopted to overcome obstacles to abortion care. Accounts from both abortion providers and women seeking care are contextualized by Ostrach s richly grounded analysis of what they reveal about healthcare systems during periods of economic crisis and disagreement over reproductive governance. The result is at once an important case study on true access to public health care and a compelling account of some women s determination to go to any length to get the health care they need. Engagingly written, it will make interesting reading for scholars, students and policymakers in the field of public health, as well as for the general reader concerned with the politics of abortion and public health."

Recenzje

"This exceptionally well-written and engaging ethnography... provides a unique example of engagement in medical anthropology... This promising first book will speak to a wide audience, offering insights for discussions in research methods and ethics classes from all disciplines, and the fields of medical and applied anthropology, women and gender studies, and public health and migration studies, to name a few."
Mounia El Kotni, Anthropology Book Forum (American Anthropological Association)

"Health Policy in a Time of Crisis is a compelling portrait of lived experiences following legal and economic reforms as recounted by those most affected. The voices of marginalized women echo throughout the narratives framing the paradox of expanded legal access and inclusion within the public health system against the reality of bureaucratic constraints that structure (and limit) access to care. Grounded in Critical Medical Anthropology’s call to unmask inequalities reproduced even in optimal settings, Ostrach explores what happens when women who are ostensibly guaranteed legal, funded abortions nevertheless encounter obstacles— economic, political, and social. Abortion care here functions as a lens through which we gain a broader understanding of the ways women navigate suboptimal and discriminatory health bureaucracies. Ostrach makes an important contribution to the anthropology of reproduction, with critical implications for other fields including feminist anthropology, gender and public health and health policy. I look forward to using it in my classes."
Melissa Cheyney, Oregon State University, USA

Spis treści

1. People, Policy & Practice  2. Catalunya, Crisis, and Cuts  3. Uneasy Collaboration  4. Las Dones (The Women)  5. Enfrentando Obstáculos (Confronting Obstacles)

O autorze

Bayla Ostrach is an Assistant Professor of Medical Anthropology and Cross-Cultural Practice, appointed in the Family Medicine Department at Boston University School of Medicine. An applied medical anthropologist by training, their research is designed to be returned to affected communities that seek to prompt changes in policy and practice.