Medicine in Search of People: Digitizing Villipuram
Sreya Dutta Chowdhury (SFB 1199)
Abstract
Ayushman Bharat, India’s Universal Health Coverage (UHC) launched in 2018, aims to provide comprehensive healthcare to over a billion people through 150,000 Health & Wellness Centers. These centers are undergoing upgrades, including data digitization.
In April 2022, the author conducted ethnographic research in Tamil Nadu, a state with a dedicated department of Public Health and Preventive Medicine. There, the Makkalai Thedi Maruthuvam (MTM) program, initiated in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, focuses on diabetes and hypertension care.
The study explores how digitization shapes patient-state-market relationships and the role of databases in healthcare operations. It highlights the transformation in healthcare delivery through networked operability, driven by healthcare workers’ efforts.
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Biographical Note
Sreya Dutta Chowdhury (SFB 1199)
Sreya is currently a PhD candidate within the Collaborative Research Center (SFB 1199 Project A05) on “Digital Governance and Re-spatialization of the Indian Nation-State”, which she joined in January 2021. Previously, she received her BA in Sociology from University of Calcutta and an MA in Sociology from Delhi School of Economics. She then completed a M.Phil. in Sociology at Jawaharlal Nehru University, funded by the Junior Research Fellowship program of University Grants Commission, India.
Sreya is interested in the sub-discipline of medical anthropology, and her PhD project focuses on health governance in India, particularly nation-wide projects that fall under the ambit of Universal Health Coverage initiatives that mediate new health and well-being and technological futures. Sreya is currently tracking digital health initiatives for hospital management, insurance management and disease surveillance in Puducherry, India.
As part of her dissertation, she conducted secondary research on civil society participation in Indian health sector. In 2020, she was principal co-investigator for a research project on “Female Frontline Community Healthcare Workforce in India during Covid-19”. The project was funded by a “Covid-19 Research Grant” provided by Azim Premji University, Bangalore. The results were published in an article on Covid-19 databases and data trouble.