Introduction to Syndemics: A Critical Systems Approach to Public and Community Health Book

Preface xiii

The Author xix

Acknowledgments xxi

Part 1 Introducing Key Concepts in Syndemics 1

1 Learning from Lichen: Reconceptualizing Health and Disease 3

On Not Planting Cut Flowers: The Weight of History 4

Germ Theory and the Biomedical Conception of Disease 4

Revolutions in Biomedical Realities 10

Problems with Postulates 11

Confronting Comorbidity 16

Toward Syndemic Reconceptualization 18

Local Knowledge 19

Connections: Human and Nonhuman 20

Summary 23

Key Terms 23

Questions for Discussion 23

Part 2 Syndemic Cases 25

2 Trucking Between the Bailiwicks: Multidisciplinarity, Sava, and Synergies in Health 27

Why Multidisciplinarity 27

The Term Syndemic 28

The SAVA Syndemic 31

SAVA Among Victims of Domestic Violence 31

SAVA Among MSM 41

SAVA Among Street Drug Users 44

SAVA Among Commercial Sex Workers 48

SAVA and Public Health 51

Summary 52

Key Terms 52

Questions for Discussion 52

3 Exemplars: Syndemic Case Studies 53

Syllables in the Biological Message 53

Varieties of Microlevel Disease Interaction 54

Syndemic Diversity 57

Renocardiac Syndemic 57

SARS-Chronic Disease Syndemic 60

Asthma-Influenza Syndemic 65

Diabulimia Syndemic 69

Summary 73

Key Terms 73

Questions for Discussion 74

4 HIV/AIDS and Other Infections: Immune Imparity and Syndemogenesis 75

Assessing the HIV/AIDS Syndemics 76

Opportunistic Infections and HIV/AIDS 77

Sexually Transmitted Disease Syndemics 77

Hepatitis and HIV/AIDS Syndemic 81

Tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS Syndemic 82

Malaria and HIV/AIDS Syndemic 87

VL and HIV/AIDS Syndemic 91

Helminths and HIV/AIDS Syndemic 93

Summary 98

Key Terms98

Questions for Discussion 99

5 Beyond Contagion: HIV/AIDS and Noninfectious Disease Syndemogenesis 101

An Aging Epidemic 101

Infectious and Chronic Disease Connections 102

Kidney Disease and HIV 107

Food Insufficiency and HIV 108

Cardiovascular Diseases and HIV/AIDS 113

Emotional and Cognitive Health and HIV/AIDS 115

Countersyndemics 118

Summary 119

Key Terms 119

Questions for Discussion 120

Part 3 Society, History, and The Environment 121

6 Inequity as a Cofactor: The Syndemic Impact of Social Disparities 123

Disease in the Time of Disparity 123

The Making Social of Disease 134

Biologizing Experience 138

Supersyndemics 153

Health and Human Rights 154

Summary 155

Key Terms 155

Questions for Discussion 155

7 Syndemics and the Worlds They Made 157

Before Now 157

Irish Famine Syndemic of 1741 161

Gibraltar Cholera Syndemic of 1865 162

Massachusetts Scarlet Fever Syndemic of the 1800s 164

Global Influenza Syndemic of 1918 166

Syndemics Among Native Americans on the American Frontier 169

Syndemics of the Mormon Migration 171

Syndemics of War 173

Summary 176

Key Terms 176

Questions for Discussion 176

8 A World Out of Balance: Emergent and Reemergent Ecosyndemics 177

Emergent Syndemics of a Troubled World 177

From Emergent Infection to Emergent Syndemic 181

Reemergent Diseases and Emergent Syndemics 184

Superinfection: Intragenus Syndemics 184

Iatrogenic Syndemics 186

Unintended Countersyndemics 189

Ecosyndemics and the Anthropocene 189

Summary 195

Key Terms 195

Questions for Discussion 195

Part 4 Applications of the Syndemic Perspective 197

9 Practical Utility: Mobilizing the Syndemic Model in the Promotion of Health and Treatment of Disease 199

Why Study Syndemics? 199

Public Health and Syndemic Prevention 200

Medical Treatment of Syndemics 206

Modeling Syndemics 217

Future Syndemics 220

Summary 220

Key Terms 220

Questions for Discussion 221

Glossary 223

References 229

Index 263