Sorcery, Christianity and the Decline of Medical Services

Uneven development and its effects: Livelihoods and urban and rural spaces in Papua New Guinea

“…Pyramid selling schemes, such as the Filipino scheme AIM Global and Questnet, have been popular in PNG (and many other countries in the region), promising their followers success in business while relying on an unsustainable pyramidal recruitment structure for returns. Many of these schemes market pseudoscientific health products, dietary supplements or overpriced cosmetics, and health workers are often the target of recruiters (Cox, 2019;Cox and Phillips, 2015). Participants are typically drawn into these schemes via a combination of financial need and aspiration for career or business advancement, and training focuses on the cultivation of an entrepreneurial disposition, a theme picked up in the PNG self-development scheme Personal Viability (Bainton, 2011).…”

Global Health, Tuberculosis and Local Health Campaigns: Reinforcing and Reshaping Health and Gender Inequalities in Lihir, Papua New Guinea

“…While some literature on Melanesia notes a strict binary between sik bilong marasin (biomedically treatable illness) and sik bilong ples (local illnesses having causes like sorcery; see e.g. Cox & Phillips, 2015), in Lihir there is no fixed or strict boundary between the two; therefore, a plurality of healthcare approaches is often sought (Macintyre et al, 2005). In this way, suggestions of sorcery do not preclude biomedical treatment.…”

27. Response to Priest, Ngolo and Stabell

“…However, there can be, and should be, more. Cox and Phillips (2015) follow the practice of critical biocultural medical anthropology, in particular the work of anthropologist and medical doctor Paul Farmer, to expand the context. They argue that there is an inverse relationship between health care and law enforcement on the one hand and the severity and suddenness of sickness and death on the other.…”