The Geopolitics of Health in South and Southeast Asia: Perspectives from the Cold War to COVID-19, edited by Vivek Neelakantan

This book provides a macro perspective of the primary determinants of health outcomes in South Asia and Southeast Asia. It advances our understanding of the healthcare landscape in the two regions and highlights the regional opportunities and challenges to tackle existing healthcare issues. While there is a large body of research that focuses on health in individual countries in the two regions, we lack an aerial view of their regional healthcare dynamics. This is one of the major contributions of the book. The Geopolitics of Health in South and Southeast Asia uses secondary data and provides a regional perspective of healthcare through a comparative case study methodological approach that includes a context-rich overview of numerous health policies and initiatives within individual countries. The introductory chapter begins with a thorough introduction to the complex regional identity of South Asia and Southeast Asia and provides the larger global and regional contexts to facilitate a better understanding of health outcomes in the regions. There are three key takeaways from the book.