This book explains the growing field of syndemic theory andresearch, a framework for the analysis and prevention of diseaseinteractions that addresses underlying social and environmentalcauses. This perspective complements single-issue preventionstrategies, which can be effective for discrete problems, but oftenare mismatched to the goal of protecting the public's health in itswidest sense.
"Merrill Singer has astutely described why health problemsshould not be seen in isolation, but rather in the context of otherdiseases and the social and economic inequities that fuel them. Animportant read for public health and social scientists."
--Michael H. Merson, director, Duke Global HealthInstitute
"Not only does this book provide a persuasive theoreticalbiosocial model of syndemics, but it also illustrates the modelwith a wide variety of fascinating historical and contemporaryexamples."
--Peter J. Brown, professor of Anthropology and GlobalHealth and director, Center for Health, Culture, and Society, EmoryUniversity
"The concept of syndemics is Singer's most importantcontribution to critical medical anthropology as it interfaces withan ecosocial approach to epidemiology."
--Mark Nichter, Regents Professor, Department ofAnthropology, University of Arizona
"Merrill Singer offers the public the most comprehensive workever written on this key area of research and policy making."
--Francisco I. Bastos, chairman of the graduate studieson epidemiology, Fundacao Oswaldo Cruz
"Exquisitely describes how this new approach is a critical toolthat brings together veterinary, medical, and social sciences tosolve emerging infectious and non-infectious diseases of today'sworld."
--Bonnie Buntain, MS, DVM, diplomate, American Collegeof Veterinary Preventive Medicine
"For too long the great integrative perspectives on modernbiomedicine and public health disease ecology and socialmedicine-have remained more or less separate. In this innovativeand provocative book, Merrill Singer develops a valuable synthesisthat will reshape the way we think about health and disease."
--Warwick H. Anderson, MD, PhD, professorial researchfellow, Department of History and Centre for Values, Ethics, andthe Law in Medicine, University of Sidney