Editor's Commentary on 'Fukushima Prefecture'

When we think of global health, we so often picture treating exotic illnesses in developing countries and romanticize the notion of bringing advanced Western medicine to those who have access to few of the technologies that we take for granted.  But like so much of medicine, global health is hardly one-size-fits-all. Sometimes it brings us to other areas of the world, where patients face threats to their health that arise not from poor hygiene and nutrition or lack of resources but from modern technology, the very tools that were conceived with the intention of moving us forward. Fukushima Prefecture reminds us, as great poetry does, that not everything - be it a symptom, a belief, or a staple of daily life, is always as it seems.

Becky MacDonell-Yilmaz