Book excerpt: In Health-in-Sickness, Pierre Morin suggests that the classical approach to defining illness and health not only lacks the elixir perspective on disturbances, an approach that is suggested by alternative medicine, but in fact, also has an “opposite placebo” effect, in creating a sense of being victimized and at fault for having the symptom. His book contains many practical examples and is useful to both health practitioners as well as patients. First and foremost, it begins a long overdue conversation about the very concepts of health and sickness, and what is considered to be “normal.” Morin's book is an important contribution to the broad transdisciplinary discussions regarding individual and collective well-being.