The Economics of Imperialism and Health: Malta's Experience

Abstract

The thesis of this article is that the prevalence of disease and premature death depends more on national, class, and gender relationships than on medical and biological factors. The political and economic realities of life in the British Colony of Malta revealed here clearly determined the severity of both infant mortality rates and the attacks of brucellosis. A brief history sets the background for an in-depth study of the interaction between socioeconomic conditions and disease in the first half of the 20th century. Britain's adherence to imperialist “free” trade policies and refusal to consider Malta's economy beyond its use as a military base had resulted in the “underdevelopment” of Malta's traditional cotton agroindustry and the erosion of household economic stability. Persistently high infant mortality rates and the absence of preventive disease measures were a clear manifestation of continuing exploitative imperialist policies. In this scenario, the devastation of the Second World War became a catalyst for change.