Money be man

Kodjo Amedjorteh Senah

The popularity of medicines in a rural Ghanaian community

Academisch proefschrift

Health care policy should be based on understanding of what takes place at the community level. This study explores how people in a coastal village in Ghana perceive and use modern pharmaceuticals. In this Gaspeaking community, 35 kilometers from the capital, there are no proper health care facilities. Most people purchase their medicines in two drugstores which sell
products that they are not supposed to sell according to government rules. The author focuses on local perceptions of anatomy and etiology and on people’s health expenditure. His book is a search for the social and cultural basis of the popularity of pharmaceuticals. “Money be man”, an inscription on a local lorry, captures the villagers’ main concern: without money one cannot remain healthy.

The author, Kodjo Amedjorteh Senah, is a lecturer at the Department of Sociology at the University of Ghana. His book is based on anthropological fieldwork in Bortianor between 1990 and 1995.

Met Nederlandse samenvatting achterin het boek