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Biopolitical endpoints: Diagnosing a deserving British nuclear test veteran

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  • Trundle, Catherine

Abstract

This article examines recent claims for healthcare made by British veterans who participated in nuclear bomb testing in the 1950s. Specifically, it focuses on their claims for war disablement pensions, exploring how they seek and challenge medical diagnoses. Detailing three veteran case studies, the article offers an ethnographic analysis of illness narratives. It explores how sufferers attempt to recast and reject the evidential burdens that they face in pension appeals, and identifies three narratives strategies that they deploy aimed at linking somatic realities to political etiologies. I propose the notion of biopolitical endpoints to capture how test veterans narratively connect political and medical domains as they seek to enable state culpability and redress.

Suggested Citation

  • Trundle, Catherine, 2011. "Biopolitical endpoints: Diagnosing a deserving British nuclear test veteran," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 73(6), pages 882-888, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:73:y:2011:i:6:p:882-888
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    1. Dumit, Joseph, 2006. "Illnesses you have to fight to get: Facts as forces in uncertain, emergent illnesses," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 62(3), pages 577-590, February.
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    Cited by:

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    4. Gøril Ursin, 2020. "Framing Dementia Care Practices: The Politics of Early Diagnosis in the Making of Care," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(3), pages 21582440209, July.

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