Between the acclimatization to high altitude, the medical anthropology and the civilizing utopia. Mapping of the evolution of thought of Carlos Monge Medrano on the health-illness process of Andean populations

Abstract

The main objective of this study is to describe how the ideas of Carlos Monge respect to high altitude sickness developed and how these were being deployed in the framework of the discussions on the living conditions of indigenous populations in the period 1928-1963. I postulate that the form how the Monge’s paradigm was proposed, the tensions produced by
various alternative movements and the way these contradictions were resolved were central, both for the subsequent development of different scientific disciplines and for their different institutional expressions in Peru. In addition, this article describes the evolutionary trajectory of Monge’s ideas about the adaptation of indigenous populations to high altitude and the discussions that emerged with other research groups around the consumption of coca leaf. It also presents an analysis of the limitations of the biomedical view regarding the health of the Andean populations, a view that was progressively influenced by the changing social and political scenario in the context of the Cold War.