A Comparison of Patients’ Local Conceptions of Illness and Medicines in the Context of C-Reactive Protein Biomarker Testing in Chiang Rai and Yangon

This article addresses antimicrobial resistance (AMR) from a social perspective, focusing specifically on patients’ antibiotic use against the backdrop of antibiotic resistance (ABR; a subset of AMR). We know from the anthropological literature that patients’ conceptions of illness and medicines influence their health-care seeking and medicine use. Yet, our understanding of the social dimensions of ABR remains surprisingly narrow—indicated by the persistent narrow focus of national and global AMR policies on awareness raising (rather than e.g., socioeconomic drivers of resistance such as poverty), by repeated calls for more social research into AMR in general5–7 and by a social science share of only 0.53% out of 17,675 documents with the key words “AMR” according to the Scopus database (as of July 31, 2017).8 The social research gap is problematic because it affects how we think about the increasing global efforts to curb AMR.