"You Killed My Baby!": The Dilemmas of Medical Intervention during Fieldwork

This article is an examination of and personal reflection on the advantages and disadvantages of providing medical care to the Peruvian Cashinahua during my 84 months of fieldwork. Although providing medical care to the Cashinahua contributed to my gaining rapport with them, it also created tensions and some hostility from their medical specialists until we established a working relationship wherein I "treated the symptoms" and they "treated the causes." In the process there was a mutual exchange of knowledge. However, providing medical services consumed vast amounts of time and energy. Failure in treatment resulted in tension, hostility, and on one occasion, the threat of death.