Further to Neil’s extract from Global Health Now, in which “many religious and cult leaders, not only in Kenya but across the region, [are] feeding followers a flawed gospel that dissuades them from seeking medical care when they are sick—claiming that only prayers can heal them. But health officials in Kenya (with police backing, at times) are working to dispel these messages.” Neil comments “The article suggests that in Kenya there is a confrontation between religious beliefs about illness and modern medicine.”
But of course this confrontation is not some kind of African trope, as is suggested here. It occurs all around the world. Take the Christian Scientists, for example, whose “adherents subscribe to a radical form of philosophical idealism, believing that reality is purely spiritual and the material world an illusion. This includes the view that disease is a mental error rather than physical disorder, and that the sick should be treated not by medicine but by a form of prayer that seeks to correct the beliefs responsible for the illusion of ill health.” Sound similar to those African witch doctors?
The largest populations of Christian Scientists are found in the United States and, overall (according to Brittanica), “In the early 21st century the church claimed more than 1,700 congregations in 80 countries, and membership estimates ranged from 100,000 to about 400,000 worldwide.”
Unlike in Kenya – where (according to the report cited by Neil), “health officials... (with police backing, at times) are working to dispel these messages...” – I have not heard about any police-backed attempts by health officials to dispel Christian Science in the USA or elsewhere.
Chris Zielinski
Centre for Global Health, University of Winchester, UK and
President-elect, World Association of Medical Editors (WAME)
Blogs; http://ziggytheblue.wordpress.com and http://ziggytheblue.tumblr.com
Publications: http://www.researchgate.net and https://winchester.academia.edu/ChrisZielinski/
HIFA Profile: Chris Zielinski held senior positions at the World Health Organization for 15 years, in Africa, WHOs Geneva Headquarters, and India, and earlier in other UN-system organizations working in writing, media, publishing, knowledge management, and intellectual property. He also spent three years as Chief Executive of the Authors Licensing and Collecting Society (looking after the intellectual property revenues of all UK authors and journalists). Chris was the founder of the ExtraMED project (Third World biomedical journals on CD-ROM), and managed the Gates Foundation-supported Health Information Centres project. At WHO he was appointed to the Ethical Review Committee, and was an originator of the African Health Observatory during his years in Brazzaville. With interests in the information, and computer ethics and bioethics, Chris has edited numerous books and journals and worked as a translator. Now working independently, Chris has recently finished writing a travel book called Afreekinout.
Email: chris AT chriszielinski.com
