During an early walk in Berlin today, I´ve discover another trace of Jewish medical history: In the front of one of the entrances of Wilmersdorf City Hall, there is a small square bearing the name of Julius Morgenroth, one of the creator of chemotherapy.
Julius Morgenroth was born in a Jewish family in Bamberg, in 1871. He studied in Freiburg, Würzburg and München. Between 1906 and 1919 he was the director of the Bacteriology Department of the Pathology Institute within the Charité. Following positions involved heading the newly created Department of Chemotherapy within the Berlin Institute for Infectious Diseases - nowadays known as Robert Koch Institute in Berlin.
Morgenroth worked closely with another fellow Jewish scientist, Paul Ehrlich, Nobel Prize winner as recognition for his works in the field of immunology. He created Rivanol, a medical substance used until today, as wound desinfectant, and studied extensively the effects of quinine against infections.
Nowadays, we refer mostly to chemotherapy as part of the anti-cancer treatments, but originally this type of method and medication referred to the substances acting specifically against pathogenic infections. Ehrlich, as well as Morgenroth contributed regularly to the development of this field of study building up the basis for the current development, which is still a work in process.
The more I discover about the Jewish contributions to the history of German medicine the more frustrated I am by the lack of systematic information in this field. Obviously, the Jewish presence into the history of medicine is a topic that deserve a better historical treatment.
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