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Cultural Meanings of Oral Rehydration Salts in Jamaica

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The Context of Medicines in Developing Countries

Part of the book series: Culture, Illness, and Healing ((CIHE,volume 12))

Abstract

Oral rehydration therapy is the replacement of fluids lost in diarrhea with drinks of water in which have been dissolved glucose (sugar), sodium bicarbonate, and sodium and potassium chlorides. Pharmaceutical firms manufacture packets of these chemicals. The packets contain mostly sugar, but they are usually labelled as Oral Rehydration Salts. The therapy was first used on a large scale among refugees from the 1971 India-Pakistan war where deaths from diarrhea dropped from 30% to 1% (Elliot and Cutting 1980a).

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References

  • Ashley, D. 1981 ‘Oral Rehydration Therapy in the Management of Acute Gastroenteritis in Children in Jamaica.’ In Acute Enteric Infections in Children, ed. by T. Holme, J. Holmgren, M. Merson and R. Mollby, pp. 389–394. Elsevier/North Holland: Biomedical Press.

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© 1988 Kluwer Academic Publishers

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Maccormack, C., Draper, A. (1988). Cultural Meanings of Oral Rehydration Salts in Jamaica. In: van der Geest, S., Whyte, S.R. (eds) The Context of Medicines in Developing Countries. Culture, Illness, and Healing, vol 12. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2713-1_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2713-1_14

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-7722-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-009-2713-1

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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