Finding out about public illness

摘要

The divergence between lay and medical constructions of disease has provided a rich seam for sociological research in the last couple of decades. The negotiations between experience and expertise that occur around illness can tell us a huge amount about the construction of scientific knowledge in public. One sub-field that has been particularly fruitful, and particularly interesting to science studies, has been the study of contested illnesses, where the reality of the illness is at stake as the prize in such negotiations. Battles over contested illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS, previously known as ME), post-traumatic stress disorder and Gulf-War syndrome have all made recent news, with the medical establishment reluctant to accept a simple explanation for a collection of symptoms, while sufferers claim that they are the only ones with any relevant knowledge.