Medicine and
Health Care
Infant mortality is high, respiratory and intestinal diseases
are endemic, and malnutrition
is widespread in a country where life expectancy is fifty-seven years.
Contributing to this situation are poverty, poor hygiene, and lack of health
care. There are hospitals only in urban areas, and they are poorly equipped and
unhygienic. Rural health clinics often lack personnel, equipment, and
medicines. Western biomedical practices have social prestige, but many poor
people cannot afford this type of health care. Many people consult shamans and
other religious practitioners. Others look to Ayurvedic medicine, in which
illness is thought to be caused by imbalances in the bodily humors. Treatment
involves correcting these imbalances, principally through diet. Nepalis combine
Ayurvedic, shamanic, biomedical, and other systems.
Although health conditions are poor, malaria has been
eradicated. Development efforts have focused on immunization, birth control,
and basic medical care. However, the success of all such projects seems to
correlate with the education levels of women, which are extremely low.
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