PreprintEssayVersion 1Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed
Are Health Innovations Techno-economic or Social Values in a period of a Health Crisis? A Reflection on the Field of Public Health through the Examples of Ebola and Covid-19
Version 1
: Received: 8 September 2020 / Approved: 10 September 2020 / Online: 10 September 2020 (06:15:43 CEST)
Version 2
: Received: 24 March 2021 / Approved: 30 March 2021 / Online: 30 March 2021 (10:29:41 CEST)
Niang, M.; Dupéré, S.; Alami, H.; Gagnon, M.-P. Why Is Repositioning Public Health Innovation towards a Social Paradigm Necessary? A Reflection on the Field of Public Health through the Examples of Ebola and Covid-19. Globalization and Health 2021, 17, doi:10.1186/s12992-021-00695-3.
Niang, M.; Dupéré, S.; Alami, H.; Gagnon, M.-P. Why Is Repositioning Public Health Innovation towards a Social Paradigm Necessary? A Reflection on the Field of Public Health through the Examples of Ebola and Covid-19. Globalization and Health 2021, 17, doi:10.1186/s12992-021-00695-3.
Niang, M.; Dupéré, S.; Alami, H.; Gagnon, M.-P. Why Is Repositioning Public Health Innovation towards a Social Paradigm Necessary? A Reflection on the Field of Public Health through the Examples of Ebola and Covid-19. Globalization and Health 2021, 17, doi:10.1186/s12992-021-00695-3.
Niang, M.; Dupéré, S.; Alami, H.; Gagnon, M.-P. Why Is Repositioning Public Health Innovation towards a Social Paradigm Necessary? A Reflection on the Field of Public Health through the Examples of Ebola and Covid-19. Globalization and Health 2021, 17, doi:10.1186/s12992-021-00695-3.
Abstract
Health innovations are generally oriented on a techno-economic vision. In this perspective, technologies are seen as an end in themselves, and there is no arrangement between the technical and the social values of innovation. This vision prevails in sanitary crises, in which management is carried out based on the search for punctual, reactive, and technical solutions to remedy a specific problem without a systemic/holistic, sustainable, or proactive approach. This paper attempts to contribute to the literature on the epistemological orientation of innovations in the field of public health. Taking the Covid-19 and Ebola crises as examples, the primary objective is to show how innovation in health is oriented towards a techno-economic paradigm. Second, we propose a repositioning of public health innovation towards a social paradigm that will put more emphasis on the interaction between social and health dimensions in the perspective of social change.
Keywords
health innovation; technological innovation; social innovation; public health; global health; Ebola; Covid-19
Subject
Public Health and Healthcare, Public Health and Health Services
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
