Farewell to the God of Plague reassesses the celebrated Maoist health care model through the lens of Mao's famous campaign against snail fever. Using newly available archives, Miriam Gross documents how economic, political, and cultural realities led to grassroots resistance. Nonetheless, the campaign triumphed, but not because of its touted mass-prevention campaign. Instead, success came from its unacknowledged treatment arm, carried out jointly by banished urban doctors and rural educated youth. More broadly, the author reconsiders the relationship between science and political control during the ostensibly antiscientific Maoist era, discovering the important role of "grassroots science" in regime legitimation and Party control in rural areas.

About the Author
Miriam Gross is Assistant Professor jointly in the history department and in the department of international and area studies at the University of Oklahoma, Norman.

Reviews
"Gross has written an important work... illuminating." Health Tomorrow: Interdisciplinarity and Internationality



Book Information
ISBN 9780520288836
Author Miriam Gross
Format Hardback
Page Count 376
Imprint University of California Press
Publisher University of California Press
Weight(grams) 771g
Dimensions(mm) 229mm * 152mm * 30mm