Medical garbage and the making of neoliberalism in India
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: In the 1980s, as plastic pervaded daily life in the Indian household, so too did it saturate everyday healthcare. Following these developments, alongside other post-liberalisation regulatory reforms, in 1998 the central government published its biomedical waste (management and handling) rules. In Chennai, the implementation of the rules has simultaneously, if inadvertently, consolidated and intensified the commoditisation of biomedical waste. This paper argues that this traffic in medical garbage is not a product of neo-liberalism in India. Instead, it is through innumerable stories like this that the "Indian neo-liberal" gains meaning.
Source: University of Warwick
Author: Sarah Hodges
Language: English
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1604677165