Disease Campaigns and the Decline of Treatment Advocacy

• In Event: 516 - Section on Medical Sociology Paper Session. Health, Biomedicine and Social Movements

Abstract

In the past 50 years, disease social movements have multiplied and gained political influence, but they have become increasingly reluctant to ask the government to intervene in healthcare. This article asks why. Using original data on the goals and political claims of over 1,000 American disease advocacy organizations from the 1960s through the 2000s, I find that many early organizations prioritized treatment. But as time passed, unfavorable political climates discouraged new organizations from focusing on treatment. When healthcare became particularly controversial, even organizations that had treatment missions refrained from pursuing this goal politically. Eventually, politically active organizations even began to drop treatment from their missions. Over the decades, the troubled politics of healthcare reshaped the field of disease advocacy, diminishing its focus on medical treatment.

Author

• Rachel Kahn Best, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor