Fu Dai-wei, a professor of history at Tsing Hua University, describes the missionaries of that period as representatives of "semi-colonial medicine." In an article on this theme, he points out the many difficulties early missionaries like Maxwell faced, and makes the important point that they would never have been able to achieve what they eventually did without the kind of military backing demonstrated in the fortuitously timed "camphor controversy."
清華大學歷史所教授傅大為稱當年傳教士「挾著外科利器與奎寧白粉行走東方」的醫療傳道為「半殖民醫療」，他在「從馬偕談清末台灣的半殖民醫療」一文中指出，最早來台的馬雅各醫師常遇困難與衝突，而後來台的傳教士之所以較為順利，是拜「樟腦紛爭」之賜。