The US–Japan Cooperative Medical Science Program Tuberculosis and Leprosy Panel's 35th Annual Research Conference, Yokohama, Japan: 19–1 July 2000

AbstractThe attitudes of physicians and drug manufacturers in the US toward patenting pharmaceuticals changed dramatically from the mid-nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth. Formerly, physicians and reputable manufacturers argued that pharmaceutical patents prioritized profit over the advancement of medical science. Reputable manufactures refused to patent their goods and most physicians shunned patented products. However, moving into the early twentieth century, physicians and drug manufacturers grew increasingly comfortable with the idea of pharmaceutical patents. In 1912, for example, the American Medical Association dropped the prohibition on physicians holding medical patents. Shifts in wider patenting cultures therefore transformed the ethical sensibilities of physicians.

Download Full-text

Breast Cancer and the Politics of Abortion in the United States

Medical History ◽

10.1017/s0025727300009145 ◽

2005 ◽

Vol 49 (4) ◽

pp. 423-444 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Patricia Jasen

Keyword(s):

Breast Cancer ◽

United States ◽

Breast Cancer Risk ◽

Cancer Risk ◽

Medical Science ◽

Historical Context ◽

Reproductive Factors ◽

The United States ◽

Specific Factor ◽

The Us

Epidemiology, like any branch of medical science, functions within a social and historical context. That context influences what questions are asked, how they are investigated, and how their conclusions are interpreted, both by researchers and by the public. The international debate over whether abortion increases breast cancer risk, which has been the subject of many studies and much heated controversy in recent decades, became so intensely politicized in the United States that it serves as a particularly stark illustration of how elusive the quest for scientific certainty can be. Although a growing interest in reproductive factors and breast cancer risk developed after the Second World War, it was not until the early 1980s, after induced abortion had been legalized in many countries, that studies began to focus on this specific factor. In the US these were the years following Roe v Wade, when anti-abortionists mounted their counterattack and pro-choice forces were on the defensive. As a result, epidemiologists found themselves at the centre of a debate which had come to symbolize a deepening divide in American culture. This paper traces the history of the scientific investigation of the alleged abortion-breast cancer link, against the backdrop of what was increasingly termed an “epidemic” of breast cancer in the US. That history, in turn, is closely intertwined with the anti-abortion movement's efforts, following the violence of the early 1990s, to regain respectability through changing its tactics and rhetoric, which included the adoption of the “ABC link” as part of its new “women-centred” strategy.

Download Full-text

Disability and Music

Music ◽

10.1093/obo/9780199757824-0256 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Neil Lerner ◽

Blake Howe

Keyword(s):

Lived Experience ◽

Disability Studies ◽

Medical Science ◽

Large Body ◽

Interdisciplinary Field ◽

The Us ◽

Embodied Experiences ◽

Prejudice And Discrimination ◽

Systemic Discrimination ◽

Work Done

In the final decades of the 20th century, as disability rights activists protested ableist prejudice and discrimination, scholars began to group themselves around the topic of disability. In 1982 the Society for Disability Studies was founded; 1990 saw the passage of the US Americans with Disabilities Act, a piece of landmark legislation that sought to address systemic discrimination on the basis of physical and mental disabilities; and conferences and journals devoted to Disability Studies began to flourish in the 1990s. The relatively young interdisciplinary field of Disability Studies approaches disability beyond the traditional epistemologies of medical science and instead considers bodily and mental differences as both embodied experiences and constructs of particular cultures and societies. Following earlier work done on gender, sexuality, and race/ethnicity, Disability Studies explores the social, cultural, and historical meanings of disability as a manifestation of human variety, celebrating disability as a difference while acknowledging the lived experience of possessing a bodily or mental impairment. While music scholars have long been aware of the possibility of composers and performers with impairments—Beethoven’s deafness is central to the narrative of Western music history—they only began to engage with ideas from Disability Studies in the first decade of the 21st century. The year 2006 was notable for both an article in a major music journal (Straus 2006, cited under Music and Disability Studies) and the first book-length study on disability in music (Lerner and Straus 2006, also under Music and Disability Studies). A large body of music scholarship quickly followed, including dissertations, conferences papers, journal articles, and monographs, and the scope and approaches to music and disability have been as varied and distinct as the human bodies and minds under study.

Download Full-text