Research: A Method of Colonization – Zafrullah Chowdhury
[১৯৭৭ সালে লেখা জাফরুল্লাহ চৌধুরী’র এই লেখাটা “Medico Friend Circle Bulletin”-এ ফেব্রুয়ারি, ১৯৮১ সালে ছাপানো হইছিল। লেখার অই ভার্সনটা এইখানে আমরা রাখতেছি।]
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Bangladesh, we say, has suffered from wars, poverty, overpopulation and natural calamities. Now we are coming to see that it has suffered as much if not more deeply, from invested aid or aid given to primarily benefit the wealthy ་ country. Let us look specifically at what has been developing in the area of medical research.
In 1905, Gates, main administrator of the Rockefeller assets, and a former Baptist minister, informed Rockefeller that ‘Quite apart from the question of persons converted, the more commercial results of missionary effort to our land is worth a thousand fold every year of what is spent on missions’ our export trade is growing by leaps and bounds. Such growth would have been utterly impossible but for the commercial conquest of foreign lands under the lead of missionary endeavor. What a boon to home industry and manufacture.’ (1)
Medicine: Force for Colonization
But it did not take long for these concerned imperialists to see that medicine could accomplish even more for them than the missionary. Throughout the underdeveloped areas of the world, the great philanthropic foundations became aware that’ medicine was an almost irresistible force in the colonization of non- industrialized countries.’ (2) But this medical care must remain in their control if it was to continue primarily for their benefit. In the Rockefeller international health programmes, it was assured that ‘the entire control of all the money would be held by our people and not the natives.’ (3) In pre-Mao China, the Peking Union Medical College which had been removed from the control of missionaries and placed under the direction of the Rockefeller Foundation was conducted entirely by their own staff from New York and a local office in Peking.’ (4)
The endeavor met with marked success. It was Welch, the first dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health, who lauded American medical scientists for their part in their country’s ‘efforts to colonize and to reclaim for civilization, vast tropical regions.’ (5)
A New Imperialism
Now a new age has set out to ‘reclaim a new republic, Bangladesh. In the past, as now, the glutted American market cried out for colonies to consume its goods. The medical research situation in the United States today contains the same urgency to find regions for expansion. First, the U. S. professional in the area of medical research, finds himself in a highly competitive system. Experience, not easily obtained at home, is required to gain positions, promotions, etc., and often just to ‘stay afloat’ in his professional field. Second, universities in the States are presently in dire need of funds, and increased prestige. Research work offers the opportunity for both, and third, the large drug companies seeking to increase their profits are out to expand the market. Bangladesh, because of the difficulties that it has faced in health and population, offers unlimited opportunities to each of the three groups described above.
