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Paul Farmer

Paul Farmer Quotes

Medical Anthropologist

Paul Farmer is an American medical anthropologist born on October 26, 1959. He has had a profound impact in the field of global health, particularly in the research and policy of tropical diseases and public health. Farmer is known for his work in providing medical services and advocating for social justice in impoverished areas.

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All Haiti Care People Should Thinking Human Rights Ifs Country Medical Medicine

Famous Paul Farmer Quotes

“For me, an area of moral clarity is: you're in front of someone who's suffering and you have the tools at your disposal to alleviate that suffering or even eradicate it, and you act.”

Suffering Moral Fronts Areas Tools Clarity Alleviate

Author:Paul Farmer

“Anywhere you have extreme poverty and no national health insurance, no promise of health care regardless of social standing, that's where you see the sharp limitations of market-based health care.”

Care Social Poverty Promise Capitalism Standing Extremes Health Care Limitation Extreme Poverty

Author:Paul Farmer

“Civil and political rights are critical, but not often the real problem for the destitute sick. My patients in Haiti can now vote but they can't get medical care or clean water.”

Real Problem Care Political Water Rights Vote Sick Clean Patient Critical Medical Real Problems Haiti Medical Care Clean Water Destitute Political Rights

Author:Paul Farmer

“But if you're asking my opinion, I would argue that a social justice approach should be central to medicine and utilized to be central to public health. This could be very simple: the well should take care of the sick.”

Ifs Should Wells Care Social Justice Simple Opinion Approach Sick Asking Social Justice Medicine Take Care Arguing Public Health

Author:Paul Farmer

“The poorest parts of the world are by and large the places in which one can best view the worst of medicine and not because doctors in these countries have different ideas about what constitutes modern medicine. It's the system and its limitations that are to blame.”

World Ideas Different Country Views Modern Worst Doctors Blame Medicine Limitation Poorest Different Ideas Modern Medicine

Author:Paul Farmer

“I mean, everybody should have access to medical care. And, you know, it shouldn't be such a big deal.”

Knows Should Mean Bigs Care Deals Should Have Access Medical Big Deal Medical Care

Author:Paul Farmer

“I'm one of six kids, and the eight of us lived for over a decade in either a bus or a boat.”

Kids Six Eight Decades Boat Bus

Author:Paul Farmer

“It is clear that the pharmaceutical industry is not, by any stretch of the imagination, doing enough to ensure that the poor have access to adequate medical care.”

Enough Care Imagination Poor Clear Industry Organization Access Medical Adequate Pharmaceutical Medical Care Pharmaceutical Industry

Author:Paul Farmer

“The biggest public health challenge is rebuilding health systems. In other words, if you look at cholera or maternal mortality or tuberculosis in Haiti, they're major problems in Haiti, but the biggest problem is rebuilding systems.”

Ifs Looks Problem Challenges Majors Mortality Public Health Haiti Rebuilding Cholera Major Problems Tuberculosis Health System Health Challenges

Author:Paul Farmer

“We've taken on the major health problems of the poorest - tuberculosis, maternal mortality, AIDS, malaria - in four countries. We've scored some victories in the sense that we've cured or treated thousands and changed the discourse about what is possible.”

Country Problem Taken Four Changed Victory Majors Aids Treated Mortality Discourse Hiv Poorest Malaria Hiv Aids Health Problems Tuberculosis

Author:Paul Farmer

“I think that looking forward it's easy to imagine more constructive help for Haiti.”

Thinking Helping Easy Imagine Looking Forward Constructive Haiti

Author:Paul Farmer

“But as for activism, my parents did what they could, given the constraints, but were never involved in the causes I think of when I think of activists.”

Thinking Given Causes Parent Involved Activism Activist Constraints

Author:Paul Farmer

“Haiti is always talking about decentralization and nothing has been so obvious, perhaps a weakness, as the centralized nature of Haitian society as being revealed by the earthquake. I mean, they lost all these medical training programs because they didn't have them anywhere else.”

Mean Has Beens Lost Talking Training Weakness Program Obvious Medical Earthquakes Haiti Haitian Training Programs Decentralization Medical Training

Author:Paul Farmer

“I recommend the same therapies for all humans with HIV. There is no reason to believe that physiologic responses to therapy will vary across lines of class, culture, race or nationality.”

Believe Humans Reason Culture Lines Race Class Response Therapy No Reason Nationality Vary Hiv

Author:Paul Farmer

“If any country was a mine-shaft canary for the reintroduction of cholera, it was Haiti - and we knew it. And in retrospect, more should have been done to prepare for cholera... which can spread like wildfire in Haiti... This was a big rebuke to all of us working in public health and health care in Haiti.”

Ifs Should Has Beens Country Done Bigs Care Mines Should Have Spread Health Care Should Have Been Public Health Retrospect Haiti Rebuke Cholera Wildfires Canaries

Author:Paul Farmer

“In fact, it seems to me that making strategic alliances across national borders in order to treat HIV among the world's poor is one of the last great hopes of solidarity across a widening divide.”

World Facts Seems Lasts Order Poor Treats Borders Divides Solidarity Strategic Alliances Hiv Great Hope National Borders

Author:Paul Farmer

“Since I do not believe that there should be different recommendations for people living in the Bronx and people living in Manhattan, I am uncomfortable making different recommendations for my patients in Boston and in Haiti.”

People Should Believe Different Patient Uncomfortable Boston Manhattan Haiti Recommendations Bronx

Author:Paul Farmer

“You can't have public health without a public health system. We just don't want to be part of a mindless competition for resources. We want to build back capacity in the system.”

Want Resources Capacity Competition Public Health Mindless Health System

Author:Paul Farmer

“I'm not an austere person.”

Author:Paul Farmer

“I've been impressed, over the last 15 years, with how often the somewhat conspiratorial comments of Haitian villagers have been proven to be correct when the historical record is probed carefully.”

Years Has Beens Lasts Records Historical Comment Impressed Proven Haitian

Author:Paul Farmer

“I can't think of a better model for Haiti rebuilding than Rwanda.”

Thinking I Can Models Haiti Rebuilding Rwanda

Author:Paul Farmer

“Some people talk about Haiti as being the graveyard of development projects.”

People Development Projects Graveyard Haiti

Author:Paul Farmer

About the Author

Born: October 26, 1959
Known for: Medical Anthropologist
Quotes: 72

Related Topics

Haiti Care People Should Thinking Human Rights Ifs Country Medical Medicine

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Books & Sources

Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the PoorRelated source material

Haiti After the EarthquakeRelated source material

Infections and Inequalities: The Modern PlaguesRelated source material

Partner to the Poor: A Paul Farmer ReaderRelated source material

To Repair the World: Paul Farmer Speaks to the Next GenerationRelated source material

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