{"title":"Bypassing the Technocratic State in South Korea","authors":"J. Flowers","doi":"10.1163/15734218-12341483","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"\nThis article reveals an important, yet hidden, Korean response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 that goes beyond the actions of the state. It focuses on the Korean medicine doctors who were excluded from any government-led public health or treatment plans for COVID-19. Bypassing the state, they used telehealth to provide herbal medicines to 20 percent of COVID-19 patients in South Korea. Traditional medicine doctors volunteered their services and financial resources to fill a gap in COVID-19 care. Most observers attribute Korean success in controlling COVID-19 to the leadership of the technocratic state with buy-in from the population. However, the case of Korea offers an example of bottom-up healthcare in a community where people chose their own native cultural resources and helps to explain how doctors were able to take the initiative to autonomously work with people in the community to help to stop the otherwise rapid transmission of the virus.","PeriodicalId":34972,"journal":{"name":"Asian Medicine","volume":"58 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2021-08-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"1","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Asian Medicine","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15734218-12341483","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"Arts and Humanities","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 1
Abstract
This article reveals an important, yet hidden, Korean response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 that goes beyond the actions of the state. It focuses on the Korean medicine doctors who were excluded from any government-led public health or treatment plans for COVID-19. Bypassing the state, they used telehealth to provide herbal medicines to 20 percent of COVID-19 patients in South Korea. Traditional medicine doctors volunteered their services and financial resources to fill a gap in COVID-19 care. Most observers attribute Korean success in controlling COVID-19 to the leadership of the technocratic state with buy-in from the population. However, the case of Korea offers an example of bottom-up healthcare in a community where people chose their own native cultural resources and helps to explain how doctors were able to take the initiative to autonomously work with people in the community to help to stop the otherwise rapid transmission of the virus.
Asian MedicineArts and Humanities-Arts and Humanities (all)
CiteScore
2.00
自引率
0.00%
发文量
12
期刊介绍:
Asian Medicine -Tradition and Modernity is a multidisciplinary journal aimed at researchers and practitioners of Asian Medicine in Asia as well as in Western countries. It makes available in one single publication academic essays that explore the historical, anthropological, sociological and philological dimensions of Asian medicine as well as practice reports from clinicians based in Asia and in Western countries. With the recent upsurge of interest in non-Western alternative approaches to health care, Asian Medicine - Tradition and Modernity will be of relevance to those studying the modifications and adaptations of traditional medical systems on their journey to non-Asian settings.