The First Thousand Days: Epigenetics in the Age of Global Health

The 1000 days between conception and a child’s second birthday is considered to be a crucial period for determining future health and potential, an understanding shaped by knowledge in the fields of the developmental origins of health and disease (DOHaD), neuroscience and epigenetics. Using a South African case study of the global ‘first thousand days’ initiative, in this chapter I examine how DOHaD and epigenetic knowledge, as ‘biosocial’ objects of enquiry, are embedded in global discourses that come to bear on the every day.