Merrill Charles Singer

University of Connecticut | UConn · Department of Anthropology

In this article, we address the nature of syndemics and whether, as some have asserted, these epidemiological phenomena are global configurations. Our argument that syndemics are not global rests on recognition that they are composed of social/environment contexts, disease clusters, demographics, and biologies that vary across locations. These poin...

In this review, we trace the origins and dissemination of syndemics, a concept developed within critical medical anthropology that rapidly diffused to other fields. The goal is to provide a review of the literature, with a focus on key debates. After a brief discussion of the nature and significance of syndemic theory and its applications, we trace...

While COVID-19 has become a global pandemic that has spread to all regions of the globe, local historic, health, and socio-environmental factors shape the epidemiological contours, response, and social challenges present within each affected nation. Thus, while countries like China, Italy, Iran, Brazil, and the United States have all been hard hit...

As originally conceived, syndemics refers to complex epidemics involving two types of adverse interaction – the clustering and interactions of two or more diseases or health conditions (the biological–biological interface) and social environmental factors (the biological–social interface). The theory has been widely applied in the fields of medicin...

This environmental epidemiology article examines the understudied issue of Latino risk in the context of climate change. The largest ethnic minority group in the U.S., Latino socioeconomic characteristics put them disproportionately in harm’s way for the adverse health impacts of climate change, including being subject to diverse forms of discrimin...

The year 2016 was the hottest year on record and the third consecutive record-breaking year in planet temperatures. The following year was the hottest in a non-El Nino year. Of the seventeen hottest years ever recorded, sixteen have occurred since 2000, indicating the trend in climate change is toward an ever warmer Earth. However, climate change d...

As an applied social science, medical anthropology not only examines specific health issues in biosocial context but also seeks to build a broad, theoretically based understanding of what health is, how culture/society and health interact, the role of social relations in shaping disease, the importance of the health/environment interface, and a ran...

Syndemics are adversely interacting diseases and other health conditions that increase the illness burden of a population, commonly as a consequence of harmful social conditions that produce multiple disease clusters and vulnerable physical bodies. Rather than individual diseases being the primary drivers of poor health in populations, often it is...

Central to this volume, and critical to its unique creative significance and contribution, is the conceptual unification of syndemics and stigma. Syndemics theory is increasingly recognized in social science and medicine as a crucial framework for examining and addressing pathways of interaction between biological and social aspects of chronic and...

In this article, we examine social responses to the 2014-2016 Ebola epidemic in Cameroon, a country near to but beyond the farthest reaches of known Ebola cases. As Ebola spread in West Africa, there was mounting anxiety that the epidemic would spill over the border with Nigeria. To investigate people’s responses to Ebola-fear, we interviewed a sam...

Foundations of Biosocial Health Stigma and Illness Interactions EDITED BY SHIR LERMAN; BAYLA OSTRACH AND MERRILL SINGER - CONTRIBUTIONS BY NICHOLAS EMARD; THEODORE GIDEONSE; SEUNG YONG HAN; SHIR LERMAN; HARRISON M.K. MAITHYA; RUTHANNE MARCUS; GERALD MCKINLEY; BAYLA OSTRACH; MARY A. OTT; ELIZABETH J. PFEIFFER; MERRILL SINGER; ALEXANDRA BREWIS; SARAH...

In this article, we examine social responses to the 2014–2016 Ebola epidemic in Cameroon, a country near to but beyond the farthest reaches of known Ebola cases. As Ebola spread in West Africa, there was mounting anxiety that the epidemic would spill over the border with Nigeria. To investigate people's responses to Ebola-fear, we interviewed a sam...

The syndemics model of health focuses on the biosocial complex, which consists of interacting, co-present, or sequential diseases and the social and environmental factors that promote and enhance the negative effects of disease interaction. This emergent approach to health conception and clinical practice reconfigures conventional historical unders...

It is estimated that over a million people die each year from infectious diseases of zoonotic origin and hundreds of millions suffer from these pervasive threats to human well-being. In light of the emergent global concern over the Zika virus, evidence that it has not one but two competent mosquito vector species in the Aedes family, and that both...

In this article, we consider whether the term “medical anthropology” is serving us as well as it could be and whether the term “health anthropology” could be more appropriate. We argue that medical anthropology is used metonymically; that is, it is a part of the field that is used, inaccurately, to describe the whole. Anthropologists research, teac...

Global climate change is contributing to a range of adverse environmental and weather shifts, including more intense and more frequent heat waves and an intensification of the urban heat island effect. These changes are known to produce a set of significant and differentially distributed health problems, with a particularly high burden among poor a...

A Companion to the Anthropology of Environmental Health presents a collection of readings that utilize a medical anthropological approach to explore the interface of humans and the environment in the shaping of health and illness around the world. Features the latest ethnographic research from around the world related to the multiple impacts of the...

Emerging infectious diseases are a critical issue in contemporary global environmental health. The 2014/15 Ebola epidemic in West Africa has become the large most widespread outbreak of the disease to date, Among its various impacts, the epidemic triggered a proliferation of emergent ethnomedical cultural responses. With the appearance of cases in...

In this article, the authors provide a layered analysis of Ebola-chan, a visual cultural artifact of the 2014–2015 Ebola outbreak. Rather than considering her as a two-dimensional anime character (i.e. as a simple iconic coping mechanism and/or a fear response), this recent Internet meme is analyzed using an integrated semiotic and structural appro...

Using the ecobiopolitical model of critical medical anthropology, this chapter focuses on the structural origins and health effects of environmental racism, with specific focus on the role of governmental and corporate policies and actions in the polluting and environmental degradation of Native American reservations. We argue that the embedded str...

While ticks, and probably tick-borne infections, have been present throughout human history, their level of impact on human health has been growing in recent years as new tick-bone diseases (TBDs), new ranges for such diseases, and tick-borne disease-interactions have been identified. These changes are the consequence of several socioenvironmental...

This chapter is about the health implications of understanding the environment as a dynamic system, conceived as an array of interactive connections, and the health consequences of the impactful role of humans in modifying physical and biological connections in the Anthropocene. Notably, human release of greenhouse gases is now recognized as the pr...

Archaeologists face a long list of job-related health risks. In recent decades, these health threats have increased because of the expanded ranges of various tick species, the growing number of human tick-borne diseases, the ability of ticks to harbor and simultaneously transmit multiple pathogens, and the spread to humans of zoonotic tick-borne di...

An Experiment in Educating Congress about the Health Effects of War We often think of long­term health effects of war in terms of a legacy of suffering for combatants and people directly affected by battlefield events. Less attention is paid to the ways that war increases the burden of disease among broader populations. Little research focuses on h...

Individuals are not island isolates. This is an old insight that finds expression in indigenous worldviews, ancient philosophies, religious doctrine, and modern social theories. Even so, science remains encumbered by the false dichotomies and reductionism inherited from the capitalist revolution and reinforced by the fragmentation of modern life. T...

The objective of neoliberal globalization, as noted by various observers, is not the improvement of global health and wellbeing but the expansion of deregulated markets in international trade and investment, a characteristic affirmed and illustrated in this article through an examination of the global commoditization of turkey tails and the role of...

There is growing awareness of the health implications of fact that infectious agents often do not act independently; rather their disease potential is mediated in diverse and significant ways by their relationships with other pathogens. Pathogen-pathogen interaction (PPI), for example, impacts various virulence factors in human infection. Although...

[ab]Based on an assessment of the available research, this article uses syndemic theory to suggest the role of adverse bio–social interactions in increasing the total disease burden of tick-borne infections in local populations. Given the worldwide distribution of ticks, capacity for coinfection, the anthropogenic role in environmental changes that...

I believe that there is no dichotomy between the natural world and the human environment. As Herzog and Burghard accurately observe, “It would be difficult to overestimate the significance of animals in the social and psychological life [as well as the biology] of our species” (1988:214). It would be equally difficult to overestimate the impact of...

Background Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a vaccine preventable infection yet vaccination rates are low among injection drug users (IDUs) despite the high risk of infection and longstanding recommendations to promote vaccination. We sought to improve vaccination rates by reaching IDUs through syringe exchange programs (SEPs) in three U.S. cities. Meth...

Diarrhoea remains the second leading cause of death in children under 5 years. Moreover, morbidity as a result of diarrhoea is high particularly in marginalised communities. Frequent bouts of diarrhoea have deleterious and irreversible effects on physical and cognitive development. Children are especially vulnerable given their inability to mount a...

In addressing the urgent questions raised by climate change, this book provides a comprehensive overview of the anthropology of climate change guided by a critical political ecological framework. It argues that anthropologists must significantly expand their focus on climate change and their contributions to responding to climate change as a grave...

Notable among gaps in the achievement of the global health Millennium Development Goals (MDG) are shortcomings in addressing maternal health, an issue addressed in the fifth MDG. This shortfall is particularly acute in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where over half of all maternal deaths occur each year. While there is not as yet a comprehensive underst...

We describe virginity loss experiences of inner-city minority youth to understand the meaning attributed to first sex and the social and structural factors that contribute to early sexual debut. We interviewed 62 18-25-year-old African American and Puerto Rican Hartford men and women about their sexual and romantic life histories. Transcripts were...

More than half of US jurisdictions have laws criminalizing knowing exposure to or transmission of HIV, yet little evidence supports these laws’ effectiveness in reducing HIV incidence. These laws may undermine prevention efforts outlined in the US National HIV/AIDS Strategy, in which the United States has invested substantial federal funds. Future...

Respiratory risks to human health are on the rise around the globe, at least in part, because anthropogenic environmental changes are increasing and multiplying the likelihood of respiratory disease comorbidity and disease interaction, a health consequence termed an ecosyndemic. The immediate objective of this paper is to examine the nature and gro...

While much attention is placed on the people at the top of the global drug trade who receive most of the profits, the people at the bottom of that trade, who are often poorly paid and working in dangerous conditions, are also worthy of in-depth study. This article focuses on the so-called “drug working class” to better explain why they do what they...

This study investigated sexual risk behaviors of at-risk males and females in the Philadelphia and Hartford Research and Education on Sexual Health and Communication (Project PHRESH.comm) study. We employed the Theory of Planned Behavior and sexual scripting theory to understand sexual risk behaviors of 18 to 25 year-old Hartford, Connecticut (CT)...

The United States is an ocean nation—our past, present, and future are inextricably connected to and dependent on oceans and marine resources. Marine ecosystems provide many important services, including jobs, food, transportation routes, recreational opportunities, health benefits, climate regulation, and cultural heritage that affect people, comm...

http://omicsonline.org/pharmapatienthood-the-patient-constructed-in-direct-to-consumer-drug-advertising-2332-0915.1000101.pdf Abstract: Over the last 15 years there has been a large body of research and considerable public debate on direct to-consumer (DTC) advertising for prescription pharmaceuticals. Concerns include the accuracy, fairness, conse...

Use of the syndemics concept has diffused from medical anthropology to an array of health-related disciplines. This development reflects a growing awareness that diseases and disease sufferers do not exist in a vacuum and that many of the most damaging human epidemics are the possible or probable consequence, not of a single disease acting alone bu...

Tropical disease syndemics, the adverse morbidity-enhancing interaction of two or more neglected tropical diseases (NTDs), like the diseases that comprise them, have been largely unrecognized and generally neglected. However, their role in contributing to the health burden of the poor is significant. This paper presents syndemics as a new theoretic...

Aims: This paper reviews the world anthropology of drugs and alcohol use literature, identifying key issues addressed by anthropologists, methods and theoretical models in use, trends in focus over time and future directions. Methods: Papers and books that comprise the literature were identified through computer search using the keywords: ethnog...

Women are at special risk for HIV/AIDS infection and disease progression due to an inter-related set of biopolitical factors. Biological factors that contribute to women’s special vulnerability include hormonal, developmental, and immunological characteristics. Social and political factors such as poverty, gendered power relationships, and violence...

Given the racial/ethnic disparities that characterize STI trends and recent increases in heterosexually transmitted HIV infection in the US, an understanding of factors underlying condom use among young adults in minority communities is vitally important. To this end, this paper presents findings from a community venue-based survey examining the in...

Although young adults in the United States are at increased risk for sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and unintended pregnancy, they do not report high rates of dual-method use (condoms plus other contraception) for prevention. We used prospective qualitative data from 69 urban Puerto Rican and African American individuals aged 18 to 25 years...

Having concurrent sexual partners is a risk factor for STIs and HIV/AIDS, yet few studies have investigated the cultural meanings and functions of concurrency. A multi-method qualitative/quantitative study of sexual ideas, attitudes, and behaviors among inner-city Puerto Rican and African American emergent adults (age 18-25) in Hartford, Connecticu...

Common strategies employed in preventing STI/AIDS transmission among young adults in America include abstinence, monogamy and safer sex. These strategies require a high level of vigilance and responsibility and, according to inner city participants in Project PHRESH.comm, neither option is always desirable, available, or rational in the context of...

IntroductionOverview of SyndemicsSyndemic ResearchAnimal-Human Connections in SyndemicsSyndemics in History: Case Study 1A Contemporary Syndemic: Case Study 2Syndemics, Medical Anthropology, And the Future of Global HealthReferences

With the massive Gulf oil spill of 2010, there has been intensified concern about the impacts of industrial contamination on physical environments, human health, and social well-being. Based on ethnographic research in a primarily African American town in an area of Southern Louisiana colloquially known as the Chemical Corridor because of the large...

Increasingly, it is recognized that traditional narrow approaches to environment and health relations are insufficient to comprehend and respond effectively to the complexity of factors influencing human health. In response, a new approach, referred to as Ecohealth has emerged with the goal of assessing the multiple interactions that occur between...

[sustainability, climate change, environment, applied anthropology, NCARE, Center for Environmental Science, sustainable development]

Proper knowledge of HIV transmission is not enough for people to adopt protective behaviors, but deficits in this information may increase HIV/AIDS vulnerability. To assess drug users' knowledge of HIV/AIDS and the possible association between knowledge and HIV testing. A Cross-sectional study conducted in 2006/7 with a convenience sample of 295 il...

Syringe exchange programs (SEPs) can reduce HIV risk among injecting drug users (IDUs) but their use may depend heavily on contextual factors such as local syringe policies. The frequency and predictors of transitioning over time to and from direct, indirect, and non-use of SEPs are unknown. We sought, over one year, to: (1) quantify and characteri...

PJ Puntenney is contributing editor of “Views on Policy,” the AAA Committee on Public Policy column in Anthropology News.

Brazil has been recognized for being the first developing country to provide universal AIDS treatment. Brazil also implemented a comprehensive prevention initiative. These efforts have been successful, with about half the number of HIV/AIDS cases forecast in 1992 developing by 2000. However, HIV/AIDS continues to spread, including among not-in-trea...

This paper argues that there are essential features of capitalist modes of production, consumption, and waste dispersal in interaction with the environment and its built-in systemic features that contradict long-term sustainable development. These features include: (a) contradictions in the origin and meaning of sustainability; (b) the central role...