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November 2002, Vol 92, No. 11 | American Journal of Public Health 1733
© 2002 American Public Health Association

IMAGES OF HEALTH

Rural Health Centers in the Americas

Elizabeth Fee, Theodore M. Brown, Jan Lazarus and Paul Theerman

Elizabeth Fee, Jan Lazarus, and Paul Theerman are with the History of Medicine Division, National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md. Theodore M. Brown is with the Departments of History and of Community and Preventive Medicine at the University of Rochester, Rochester, NY.

Correspondence: Requests for reprints should be sent to Elizabeth Fee, PhD, Building 38, Room 1E21, 8600 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, MD 20894 (e-mail: elizabeth_fee{at}nlm.nih.gov).


   INTRODUCTION
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 INTRODUCTION
Reference
 

Source. Courtesy of the Pan American Health Organization, circa 1960s, Bolivia. Photographer: Dana Downie

THE PAN AMERICAN HEALTH Organization, in existence since 1902, became a regional office of the World Health Organization in 1949. It elected its first Latin American director, Dr Abraham Horwitz of Chile, in 1958. Recognizing that the vast preponderance of health facilities and medical personnel were clustered in the cities, Horwitz decided on a "rural strategy," targeting the 40% of the population living in rural areas, who generally had no access to health services. Rural health centers, such as the one shown in this image, were built in many countries of the Americas.

Health auxiliaries, trained to use simple scientific techniques, were responsible for providing immunizations, oral rehydration therapy, family planning, and other preventive measures.1 They also provided health education. Classes on nutrition, prenatal and perinatal care, and special programs for women and children were emphasized, as women of childbearing age and children together made up two thirds of the population of Latin America. Children predominate in this image of crowds lining up to receive their immunizations.

Women were encouraged to breastfeed their infants. Considerable efforts were also made to improve nutritional standards through the preparation of highly nutritive vegetable protein mixtures and the fortification of common foodstuffs, such as the addition of iodine to salt and of vitamin A to sugar. "Community participation" was advocated as a means of bringing people into the rural health centers, engaging them in health promotion activities, and helping to spread health education messages throughout the population.


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1. The right to health—1958–1975. Bull Pan Am Health Organ. 1992;26: 325–335.[Medline]





This Article
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Right arrow Rural Health

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