Tag: childbed fever
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Washing our hands
Anthony PapagiannisThessaloniki, Greece Ever since Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, washed his hands before condemning Jesus Christ to death by crucifixion, this simple act of personal sanitation has been used as the figurative icon of a disclaimer, the denial of responsibility. Today, in the climate of the current COVID-19 pandemic, handwashing is not…
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We are all hospitalized (metaphorically speaking)
F. Gonzalez-CrussiChicago, Illinois, United States Among the many species of adversity that unavoidably befall us during life, to become a hospitalized patient is not the slightest. Today, hardly anyone is exempted: life begins and ends inside hospital quarters. We are born in some obstetrics suite and die amid beeps of life-supporting equipment, the hiss of…
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Lajos Markusovszky: Semmelweis’s best friend
Constance PutnamConcord, Massachusetts, United States The name “Ignaz Semmelweis” is at least vaguely familiar to many people, even if they need reminding that he was “the hand-washing guy.” He was the first fully to grasp why so many apparently healthy women died in childbirth. His hypothesis (which he supported with elaborate if sometimes-flawed statistics) was…
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Alexander Gordon and puerperal fever
C. John ScottAberdeen, Scotland The epidemic of childbed (puerperal) fever that struck the city of Aberdeen, Scotland, between December 1789 and March 1792 was unusual. It occurred not in the dirty, crowded, and ill-ventilated wards of lying-in hospitals, but throughout the city and surrounding villages. Serendipitously, one doctor cared for most of the patients. This…