Year 25+

Idea(l)s can kill. There was nothing fuzzy or woolly about the machine guns and bayonets and bombs and living graves of totalitarianism and anti-Semitism during World War II. Yet from the ashes of that horrific century sprung the concept of human rights and health. The Nuremberg Code was created during the 1946 and 1947 trials of Nazi doctors. Other types of rights infringements during this century, such as Tuskegee, demonstrated the necessity and relevance of these simple codes and ideals in more recent times. The AIDS movement borrowed much from these concepts- along with important ideas from the civil rights movement- to eventually ensure treatment for HIV patients in the developed world. Now the developing world is beginning to reap the rewards of such activism. The story of this ideal, the idea of health as a human right, remains alive and controversial and pertinent to issues ranging from child and maternal health, to passive and active health care allocation, to the United States' debate about universal health care. 

Can idea(l)s heal? Stay tuned.