Long before the Lele people of Papua New Guinea had significant contact with the Western world and Christianity, they had developed a framework for understanding sickness and healing with a strong emphasis on the unseen world. This study examines how mature Lele Christians of the Evangelical Church of Manus assess traditional health concepts in light of their Christian faith and Scripture. By using cognitive theory as an interpretive approach, this research serves as a case study to illustrate the mental processes that take place when Christians in an animistic context make sense of their traditional culture. Simon Herrmann spent 15 years in Papua New Guinea, the United States and Malaysia. He now works as a lecturer in Intercultural Theology at the Internationale Hochschule Liebenzell (IHL).

This book combines new research data with findings from present-day health surveys to examine the history of ill health and its outcomes, whether recovery or death, in Europe and North America from the 17th century to the present. Some forecasts about future sickness rates and trends are included.

“God is said in Scripture to send what he can (but doth not) hinder from being sent.” – Edward Bird (1726)God has been taking the blame for sickness and disease for centuries. We have been told that He sends sickness as an aid to spiritual growth and piety or as a punishment for sin. Vast amounts of Scripture have been cited to support this claim.This idea has contributed to the lack of faith prevalent in the church today for healing and deliverance. After all, if God gave a person sickness then His willingness to heal is questionable. Faith can only be present where the will of God is known. However, if sickness is seen as an enemy of God then faith in God’s willingness to heal is more likely to rise.Numerous apologetic books have been written in support of divine healing, but most have not dealt completely with the many Biblical passages that appear to make God the direct cause of sickness. This book is different in that it will look at these difficult Bible passages in light of the permissive idiom of the ancient Hebrew language, in which God is often said to do the things that He merely allowed or permitted to happen. Those passages in both the Old and New Testaments that make God appear to be a cold and cruel dispenser of sickness and disease will be seen in a new light. You will see God’s loving character vindicated, your Bible will be a fresh source of blessing, and your faith in God for health and healing will soar.

This definitive study of shamanic theory and practice was developed through a four-person collaboration: three Tohono O'odham Indians--a shaman, a translator, and a trained linguist--and a non-Indian explicator. It provides an in-depth examination of the Piman philosophy of sickness as well as an introduction to the world view of an entire people.

African horse sickness virus is a double-stranded RNA virus which causes a non-contagious, infectious arthropod-borne disease of equines and occasionally dogs. Nine distinct, internationally recognised serotypes of the virus have so far been identified. This book is based upon the findings of two programmes funded by the European Commission. It will be of value not only to the specialist research workers but also to veterinary workers dealing with control and to legislators seeking to promote safe international movement of equines. The topics covered include state-of-the-art discussions on diagnostics, vaccines, molecular biology, vector studies, and epidemiology.

Too many workers leave the labour market permanently due to health problems or disability, and too few people with reduced work capacity manage to remain in employment. This is a social and economic tragedy common to virtually all OECD countries. It ...

Among the array of diseases which brought death to Tudor England, the sweating sickness stood out, for the speed with which it struck, its dreadful effects on its victims and the death rates which it produced, that together generated a fear verging on panic when it was identified. The sweating sickness attacked the cities, towns and the countryside, not sparing the palaces. It threatened everyone, from the king in his castle to the beggars at his gates, including members of the dynasty and the political structure, the courtiers and those who directed the government, the church and the law. Contemporaries could do little more than make a bolt for it, and that included the king and his closest advisors, who moved furtively in a small group from one house to another away from London. The principal epidemics came between 1485, when it made its first appearance, and 1551, and it was confined to England and Wales, apart from one major eruption across northern Europe in 1529. Known as the English disease, this rapidly acting virus became Henry VIII’s overriding fear, aggravating his well-known hypochondria and controlling his movements. The nature of the sweating sickness, its incidence and impact are all examined in this book, in the context not only of Tudor England and the problems of the Henrician succession, but also in the context of epidemic disease in Europe more widely. This book teases out the similarities and differences between ‘the sweat’ and its better-known, if equally feared, contemporary infectious disease, bubonic plague.