Medical Nemesis

By Ivan Illich

Subjects: Maladies iatrogéniques, Iatrogenic Disease, Hygiène, Medical Ethics, Politics, Hygiene, Medical care, Iatrogenic diseases, Salud pública, Medical ethics, Social Medicine, Latrogenic disease, Filosofia, Quality of Health Care, Medicina social, Delivery of health care., Medical care., Public Health, Social medicine, Sociale gezondheidszorg, Médecine, Administración, Medical Philosophy, Medicalisering, Soins médicaux, Delivery of Health Care, Médecine sociale, Medicine, Philosophie, Philosophy

Description: "The medical establishment has become a major threat to health. The disabling impact of professional control over medicine has reached the proportions of an epidemic. Iatrogenesis, the name for this new epidemic, comes from iatros, the Greek word for physician, and genesis, meaning origin. Discussion of the disease of medical progress has moved up on the agendas of medical conferences, researchers concentrate on the sick-making powers of diagnosis and therapy, and reports on paradoxical damage caused by cures for sickness take up increasing space in medical dope-sheets ... The public has been alerted to the perplexity and uncertainty of the best among its hygienic caretakers ... This book argues that panic is out of place. Thoughtful public discussion of the iatrogenic pandemic, beginning with an insistence upon demystification of all medical matters, will not be dangerous to the commonweal."--Introduction.