Introduction

This chapter examines the categories that public health professionals in the United States normally use in generating health data, epidemiological explanations of disease, and health policies. In “The Untold Story,” T. K. Sundari first looks at how the health care systems and economic problems of developing countries contribute to high maternal mortality rates. In “Medical Metaphors of Women’s Bodies,” Emily Martin shows how medical images of women’s bodies have, for the past two centuries, been based on metaphors of industrial production and hierarchical organization. In “More than Mothers and Whores,” Kathryn Carovano documents how these narrow constructions of women’s roles have affected the design and delivery of AIDS prevention services around the world. The point of all these essays is that women, at home and on the job, are likely, in all countries, to be subject to far more strain and pressure than their male counterparts in the same socioeconomic strata.