Medical Anthropology at UCL

Memes, Migrants, And The Epidemiological Imagination

JOSH BABCOCK As COVID-19 escalated to officially pandemic proportions early this year, Coronavirus-prevention advice began circulating via Facebook and WhatsApp in Singapore. Mostly in English and Mandarin, the advice ranged from speculative antiviral uses of onions—“Slice an onion and leave it in the middle of the room overnight so it absorbs all the viruses”—to more…

Pandemic Predictions- The World Post-Covid-19 for Indian Females

DEVASHREE JUVEKAR As the entire world is grappling with the novel coronavirus pandemic, many experts and researchers have predicted a number of social and economic changes that the world would undergo post-pandemic, ranging from an increase in nationalism and decrease in globalization to changes in food choices and a global hunger crisis. I am going…

Mental Health Avenues Amidst A Global Pandemic: Conceptualising The Biosocial Medical Framework Within Urban ‘Green Spaces’

TIFFANY LOERA Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. This is my morning mantra. As I lay in my bed in the early hours of the morning, I am aware of the limited capacity I have to walk the short distance to my workspace. Like clockwork, the strict schedule I have carefully designed for maximum productivity, relentlessly and…

Sociological Reflections In Times Of Change And Uncertainty: Managing Risk, Trying To Adapt And Being Creative

CATARINA DELAUNAY Covid-19 crisis is not democratic in the sense that it affects everyone equally regardless of age, gender, class, ethnicity or geographic area where one lives, as some try to defend. Containment measures were imposed based on the life style and living conditions of the middle class, without considering those with less capacity and…

Sociological Reflections In Times Of Change And Uncertainty: Surveillance, Control And Punishment

CATARINA DELAUNAY On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global pandemic on Covid-19. Several countries, across the world, including Portugal, declared a state of emergency, and have been taking several measures, with a strong impact both on people’s daily lives, and in various sectors of the economy and society. Being a…

The ‘Invisible Enemy’: A Critical Look at the Use of Military Metaphors and Anthropomorphisation During The COVID-19 Pandemic

JAMES FOTHERBY In mid-March, before becoming infected with Coronavirus, Boris Johnson declared that his government must act like “any wartime government” while facing a deadly “enemy”. During Johnson’s admission to the Intensive Care Unit in early-April, Michael Gove stated that the Cabinet Office would continue to “marshal all the resources of government in the fight…

Trench Warfare of Mindsets in Switzerland’s Approach to The COVID-19 Pandemic

HÜSLER SAMIRA-SALOMÉ & PYTHON ANNICK MARIA ILDIKO On 26 March 2020, the Federal Council declared an extraordinary situation in accordance with the Epidemic Act and issued a set of measures, including the closure of all the shops, restaurants, bars and other leisure facilities. Businesses at which the recommended distance cannot be maintained (e.g. hairdressing salons)…

COVID-19 Stories: How PhD Students are Experiencing Disruption And Uncertainty During The Pandemic

VAS PAPAGEORGIOU, WILL KENDALL AND LIDIA LUNA PUERTA We are graduate students at an extraordinary time. At the early stage of our careers, we were still learning how to live and work in the world of academia. Now, as the COVID-19 outbreak unfolds across the world, students globally are having to adapt to yet another…

Equine PPID Connectivities and Covid-19: 2020 Journal Reflections

KIM CROWDER March 8th. I book a routine vet visit for my geriatric rescue pony’s annual vaccinations and hormone-monitoring test. March 22nd. In line with pandemic protocols the vet cancels all non-emergency equine visits. March 24th. It’s suddenly warm. The pony looks unwell, overheating in his super-shaggy winter coat. The grass is growing fast, flushed…

“In Beijing They Eat Snakes And Then Pig Out”: Xenophobia, Geopolitics, and the Role of the Italian Far-Right in Covid-19 Constructions of China

FRANCESCO FLORIS Well before the high rate of infections grew and lay citizens became affected by COVID-19 in Italy, fear, news from China, fake news, and the statements of some politicians, were already circulating. These circumstances lead to a growing wave of diffidence towards the Chinese communities in the country, culminating with acts of racial…

Why do we talk about Eurobonds? Or: The Big Division in the Euro Area

INGA AENNE FELDMANN The corona virus health crisis sent many countries of the world in a lock down to protect their elderly and vulnerable from severe illness and death. With the pandemic epicentre reaching Europe in March 2020, also the European Union (EU) Member States (MS) shut down – but while most of them are…

A Lesson In Composure: Learning From Migrants In Times Of Covid-19

CHRISTIAN UNGRUHE The Covid-19 pandemic teaches a number of painful lessons. Many people, persistently deprived from access to adequate health care, housing, education or jobs, pay a devastating price for structural inequalities. For some, think of refugees on the road or holding out in camps, political measures such as lockdowns may even worsen their already…

“Getting Closer” Through Art: Facebook and Turning to Art in The Time of Covid-19

MANUELA PELLEGRINO How to feel close when physically distant? This is, of course, not a new dilemma in itself; indeed, people who live far from their loved ones have long relied on technological solutions: video-calls with multiple participants, for instance, re-establish a ‘visual’ connection, albeit deprived of tactile sensory perception. Social distancing, however, has become…

In The Midst Of COVID 19, The Search For The Missing In Mexico Continues

CAMILA RUIZ SEGOVIA Night had fallen at the coastal state of Veracruz, Mexico, when a group of men kidnapped Luis Guillermo, 29. He was an independent businessman by day and a DJ by night, according to Lucía, his mother. The date was June 28, 2013. Nearly seven years after he went missing, his whereabouts remains…

Experiencing Corona Virus in the Andes

LUCIA STAVIG A mix of huaynos, cumbia, and bird song still greet the sun in the Andean community in which I am riding out the month-long quarantine. At first glance, it might seem that not much has changed for this community in the age of COVID-19. Women in polleras still take their pigs and sheep…

The New Public Care: Seeking Coronavirus Truth through Networked Publics

MAGDALENA GÓRALSKA Before the pandemic begun the usual turn of events was like that: Beata, an accountant from a mid-size town in Poland has a health problem, or her husband has. She is not satisfied with medical advice given by doctors from either private or public healthcare sectors. She picks up her smartphone (she’s 60…

The Logic of ‘Advanced Deployment’ to Tackle COVID-19 in Taiwan

YI-CHENG WU I was planning to return to the UK to complete my PhD study before the coronavirus swept Europe. The Taiwanese government’s travel ban on medical personnel made my situation trickier. As a healthcare worker, it is embarrassing to ask for leave when all my colleagues are being urged to stay for the need…

Towards A Bright Post-Apocalypse

ERIC ORLOWSKI It was Walter Benjamin (1974 [1940]) who observed that we only experience history such as it is, when it stands still. However, he referred more so to the study of history, which was always the study of a mere snapshot of the true events, or indeed to the material ruins of the past:…

Biosocial Medical Anthropology in the Time of Covid-19. New Challenges and Opportunities.

SAHRA GIBBON, LEWIS DALY, AARON PARKHURST, CARRIE RYAN, GUL DENIZ SALALI AND ALEX TASKER As the events of the past few months concerning the coronavirus have unfolded across the globe, those of us who teach on a newly established MSc in Biosocial Medical Anthropology have become acutely aware of the immediate relevance of this unique…

Post-Pandemic Eating: What Will Food Culture Look Like After COVID-19?

KOMAL BHATIA I have six and a half kilos of dried lentils and beans in my pantry. This excludes the kilo of peppery papad, a half-used packet of gram flour, quarter kilo of soy granules, and a dense kilo of vadi (a dehydrated spicy lentil dumpling found in most Sindhi homes) that are awaiting their turn…