Health Heroes: The Battle Against Disease (1959)

today doctors know many ways of keeping us healthy partly because of the work of five important men of science we call health heroes nearly three hundred years ago anthony von lavenhook a dutch merchant made a hobby of building microscopes in 1675 with a simple microscope von lavin hook saw whole living things that were invisible to the naked eye they were tiny moving objects which he called little animals from his drawings we know that von lavenhook probably was the first man to see bacteria he described the basic shapes by which bacteria are classified today the sphere the rod and the spiral but leaven hook studies marked the beginning of our knowledge of the tiny living things we call microorganisms and of our understanding of how they affect our health edward jenner an english doctor in 1796 found a way to prevent smallpox a disease which had killed thousands of people jenner observed that people who worked around cows usually did not get smallpox but they did get a much milder disease called cow pox in a famous experiment a milkmaid named sarah nelms helped jenner test his idea that having cowpox might prevent a person from getting smallpox jenner took liquid from a cow park sore on sarah nelms and then he injected this liquid into the arm of a boy named jimmy phipps in a few days the boy had developed cow park sewers jenner knew this meant he had cow pox after the boy had recovered from cow pox jenner injected him with the liquid he had taken from a smallpox this should have given him smallpox but jimmy phipps did not get smallpox today we would say that he had been vaccinated jenner had discovered a means of preventing diseases a way of making a person immune to them today we understand why vaccination and other forms of immunization work when weak organisms of a disease are injected into us antibodies are produced which can resist that disease or a similar disease means of immunization against many diseases have now been developed because of jenner's first experiments louis pasteur a french scientist made many important health discoveries in the late eighteen hundreds one discovery came about as a result of his studies on the spoiling of wines and beers pasteur hoped to learn why some wines and beers turn sour examining sour liquids through a microscope pasteur saw bacteria the little animals von lavenhook first saw it seemed to pasteur that it was these bacteria that caused souring but where did they come from pasteur believed that bacteria came from the air that bacteria are all about us and he set out to prove his theory in a flask he boiled a broth to destroy the bacteria that were in the broth and in the air inside the flask while the boiling continued pasteur sealed the curved neck of the flask so no outside air could enter it many days passed but the broth without bacteria did not spoil then pasteur opened the flask to the outside air within a few days the broth had spoiled now pasteur was certain his theory had been correct bacteria and other microorganisms are in the air all about us if a broth can become infected he reasoned so can people pasteur was the first to show that diseases are caused by microorganisms in other experiments pasteur found that temperatures lower than boiling could destroy bacteria this knowledge was put to use many years later for destroying harmful bacteria in milk in honor of pasteur the process was called pasteurization robert koch a german doctor continued the study of bacteria that pasteur's important work had begun many cattle and sheep in europe in the late 1800s were dying from a disease called anthrax in his experiments coke hoped to find the organism that caused anthrax in the blood of a sick animal through a microscope coke observed in the blood of sheep certain organisms that he suspected caused anthrax now he had to prove his beliefs his plan was to nourish the organisms so they would multiply outside the body of a sheep when new organisms had been produced from the original ones coke injected them into a healthy sheep soon the animal became ill and died of what seemed to be anthrax now coke extracted blood from the dead animal so he could examine it through a microscope the organisms he saw were of the same type as those he had grown and injected into the sheep in finding the organism that caused anthrax coke had also shown it was possible to produce a growth or colony of microorganisms outside a living body now scientists had a means of studying disease-producing organisms and of finding ways to destroy them the work of joseph lister an english surgeon helped protect our health in another way in the eighteen fifties operations were usually dangerous for people often died from infections that occurred after surgery lister believed if people were not exposed to microorganisms while they were being operated on they might have a better chance of surviving and so in 1864 dr lister experimented by spraying the air of his operating room with carbolic acid which he knew had the power to destroy microorganisms then to the part of each patient's body that was to be operated on he applied a solution of carbolic acid destroying the microorganisms there before he operated he soaked the instruments he would use in carbolic acid and washed his hands in the acid too he insisted on complete cleanliness in the operating room lister found as he had suspected that bacterial infections occurred less frequently in patients who were operated on under sanitary conditions this was the beginning of modern antiseptic surgery surgery performed with sterilized instruments under completely sanitary conditions an antiseptic procedure to safeguard our health during operations we have seen the important contributions made by five health heroes when leeuwenhoek developed a microscope through which he saw bacteria and began the study of them jenner was the first to develop a means of preventing disease by immunization pasteur proved that disease is caused by microorganisms and that they can be killed with heat cork developed a way of isolating microorganisms and growing them outside a living body so that microorganisms could be studied and ways could be found of destroying them lister showed the importance of keeping disease producing organisms out of wounds during operations though these five health heroes have contributed much to our health their work is only a small part of the work of many thousands of unknown scientists helping us to understand the nature of disease and learn how to prevent it because of the work of these many men and women we can all look forward to happier healthier lives you