I mean the question about specialized treatment is a valid one but again I am not sure how valid it is in the face of the Maoist project being dead for 50 years. We cannot really definitively say that the latest advancements would not have been procured by the state later on, and again I am not sure that we can sya the state of the field today is one where every villager has access to an MRI machine. There are certain treatments one cannot get in the UK under free healthcare today, but you can get them in the US if you pay a shit ton of money. The UK still has 'universal' healthcare, though, as it can offer some treatment of the illness even if not the specific, best one. The US will give it to you if you are willing to pay a shit ton of money. I would wager we would both take the former.
TCM is a moniker that actually a lot of Sinologists really get irritated at. My apology if I did as well. We don't like it because it projects the idea of a single or even single continuum of traditional practices that were part of a body of scientific or pseudo-scientific knowledge in pre-modern China. But no such body existed. Much of the stuff was actually invented after the fact, many of the medicinal prescriptions were practiced by people that were very much at odds with each other, and the idea of medicine in say Qing-era China was radically different. TCM is very much an invented category for what is largely a set of practices that were made traditional, rather than really representing 'tradition'.
It is more 'espoused today' in the sense that, again, Maoist era officials hated the idea of anything 'traditional', invented or not, and strictly forbid 'superstitious' practices like qigong etc. Again there is nothing about these practices that are deeply rooted in a singular 'Chinese culture' because that singularity is actually a lot more hetereogenous than people give it or credit for, and a lot of these supposedly popular 'ancient' practices were only made popular after the fact.
If you want a good source on healthcare in China today vs the Maoist era, Martin Whyte has written a lot on this.
We cannot really definitively say that the latest advancements would not have been procured by the state later on
we can't definitively say anything regarding hypotheticals in general, right?
and it's also very hard to compare because, for instance, i could use your example to say "see, even the UK, one of the richest countries on earth, has been unable to provide certain specialized care for its citizens", but that leaves out the fact that they're a capitalist country, which implies different priorities for the government; or i could try to be more fair and mention how cuba, which has a similar per capita GDP and a socialist government still has trouble acquiring medicines and specialized equipments, but that in turn leaves out the embargo and how this relates to the fact that most of those are produced by american companies
but i think that would be pointless as i'm not arguing the current healthcare system is better: but that it has the potential of being such, whereas i don't see this being the case for the previous one
TCM is a moniker that actually a lot of Sinologists really get irritated at. My apology if I did as well.
it's cool, if you did i didn't notice it
i get what you mean about TCM. i'll try to be more specific next time
If you want a good source on healthcare in China today vs the Maoist era, Martin Whyte has written a lot on this.
Yes but I think the lack of definitiveness is what makes history so compelling to me! There were potentials for something different, and we cannot erase them. I guess ultimately my stance on this is that I do not genuinely believe that the CCP introducing market forces into healthcare was necessary for good health outcomes (in fact, there is also a lot of literature on how access to certain technologies such as MRIs also does not wholly necessitate better health outcomes). Whole other sectors of the economy (defense, energy) were shielded from marketization due to national interests. Why couldn't healthcare also have been shielded? Important to note that the UK may be a rich country but the NHS is breaking down because the Tory party doesn't want to fund it. China has the will to fund lots of infrastructure projects for example. Money could be found for an expansion of public healthcare as well, but Whyte argues the issue is that China's aging society plus the total lack of any welfare infrastructure means that the costs would be tremendous (along the lines of Japan, but without the benefit of Japan being an already wealthy society). That is a political economical deficiency that was caused, he argues, by the one child policy and also macroeconomic policy in the 80s and 90s that left poor provinces at the mercy of the market.
So while I agree that a one to one comparison of the healthcare systems of Maoist and post Mao China isn't the most helpful, I also don't share your optimism about the current model getting much better, simply because I do fundamentally believe that the sector could have been left decommodified to some degree or at least wholly state owned.
I mean the question about specialized treatment is a valid one but again I am not sure how valid it is in the face of the Maoist project being dead for 50 years. We cannot really definitively say that the latest advancements would not have been procured by the state later on, and again I am not sure that we can sya the state of the field today is one where every villager has access to an MRI machine. There are certain treatments one cannot get in the UK under free healthcare today, but you can get them in the US if you pay a shit ton of money. The UK still has 'universal' healthcare, though, as it can offer some treatment of the illness even if not the specific, best one. The US will give it to you if you are willing to pay a shit ton of money. I would wager we would both take the former.
TCM is a moniker that actually a lot of Sinologists really get irritated at. My apology if I did as well. We don't like it because it projects the idea of a single or even single continuum of traditional practices that were part of a body of scientific or pseudo-scientific knowledge in pre-modern China. But no such body existed. Much of the stuff was actually invented after the fact, many of the medicinal prescriptions were practiced by people that were very much at odds with each other, and the idea of medicine in say Qing-era China was radically different. TCM is very much an invented category for what is largely a set of practices that were made traditional, rather than really representing 'tradition'.
It is more 'espoused today' in the sense that, again, Maoist era officials hated the idea of anything 'traditional', invented or not, and strictly forbid 'superstitious' practices like qigong etc. Again there is nothing about these practices that are deeply rooted in a singular 'Chinese culture' because that singularity is actually a lot more hetereogenous than people give it or credit for, and a lot of these supposedly popular 'ancient' practices were only made popular after the fact.
If you want a good source on healthcare in China today vs the Maoist era, Martin Whyte has written a lot on this.
we can't definitively say anything regarding hypotheticals in general, right?
and it's also very hard to compare because, for instance, i could use your example to say "see, even the UK, one of the richest countries on earth, has been unable to provide certain specialized care for its citizens", but that leaves out the fact that they're a capitalist country, which implies different priorities for the government; or i could try to be more fair and mention how cuba, which has a similar per capita GDP and a socialist government still has trouble acquiring medicines and specialized equipments, but that in turn leaves out the embargo and how this relates to the fact that most of those are produced by american companies
but i think that would be pointless as i'm not arguing the current healthcare system is better: but that it has the potential of being such, whereas i don't see this being the case for the previous one
it's cool, if you did i didn't notice it
i get what you mean about TCM. i'll try to be more specific next time
right, putting it on the list
Yes but I think the lack of definitiveness is what makes history so compelling to me! There were potentials for something different, and we cannot erase them. I guess ultimately my stance on this is that I do not genuinely believe that the CCP introducing market forces into healthcare was necessary for good health outcomes (in fact, there is also a lot of literature on how access to certain technologies such as MRIs also does not wholly necessitate better health outcomes). Whole other sectors of the economy (defense, energy) were shielded from marketization due to national interests. Why couldn't healthcare also have been shielded? Important to note that the UK may be a rich country but the NHS is breaking down because the Tory party doesn't want to fund it. China has the will to fund lots of infrastructure projects for example. Money could be found for an expansion of public healthcare as well, but Whyte argues the issue is that China's aging society plus the total lack of any welfare infrastructure means that the costs would be tremendous (along the lines of Japan, but without the benefit of Japan being an already wealthy society). That is a political economical deficiency that was caused, he argues, by the one child policy and also macroeconomic policy in the 80s and 90s that left poor provinces at the mercy of the market.
So while I agree that a one to one comparison of the healthcare systems of Maoist and post Mao China isn't the most helpful, I also don't share your optimism about the current model getting much better, simply because I do fundamentally believe that the sector could have been left decommodified to some degree or at least wholly state owned.