Medical populism in the Asia Pacific

Event status:

A Philippines Australia Forum at La Trobe University seminar

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Date:
Friday 12 May 2023 02:00 pm until Friday 12 May 2023 03:00 pm (Add to calendar)
Contact:
Philippines Australia Forum at La Trobe University
philippine.australia.forum@latrobe.edu.au
Presented by:
Gideon Lasco MD, PhD
Type of Event:
Seminar/Workshop/Training; Public

Presented by Gideon Lasco, MD, PhD from the University of the Philippines Diliman, this presentation introduces the concept of medical populism and presents illustrative examples from the Asia Pacific region. As a political style, medical populism encapsulates the performative repertoire often employed by influential figures like politicians during health crises. It provides a descriptive vocabulary that illuminates how these figures rely on the simplification of crisis discourse, dramatization of crisis response, propagation of knowledge claims, and forging of divisions between the public and dangerous ‘others’  to portray health crises as societal emergencies in need of urgent interventions. I apply this concept by reconstructing three contemporary crises in the region: the war on drugs launched by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra in Thailand in 2003, the controversy surrounding the mass vaccination of Dengvaxia in the Philippines in 2017, and the COVID-19 pandemic in India as filtered through the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. These case studies reveal how medical populism tends to obscure the larger, systemic nature of a health crisis; but, as a familiar pattern of governance and a recurring feature of the politics of health, is also amenable to anticipation and possible intervention.

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