Overview

"SEMMELWEIS by best-selling author is the Life and Work of pioneering physician Ignaz P. Semmelweis, who discovered the causes and means of prevention of the pandemic of his day, childbed fever. Called the ""Father of Antisepsis,"" he was largely ignored, placed in an asylum and murdered. What lessons do his extraordinary life & work carry forward to today? This book details his life from his beginnings in a small town in Budapest, Hungary through the early years of his medical career in Vienna, the process by which he discovered the causes & means of childbed fever--and his theory of infection fifty years before Louis Pasteur--his & a few colleagues' attempts to desseminate his work worldwide, his expulsion from Vienna, his attempt to lead a conventional lfie of wife and children, his physical and mental decline and finally his incarceration in an insane asylum where he was killed. A reflex is named for him. The Semmelweis Reflex: human behavior characterized by the reflex rejection of new knowledge that goes against entrenched norms, beliefs, and paradigms.SEMMELWEIS by best selling author Anthony Valerio is supported by years of reseach and is all true and, at the same time, reads like a medical thriller told by an acclaimed storyteller. From the author: I wrote the last draft of this book in the winter of 2019, more than a year before the current pestilence, which kills indiscriminately, and more than 170 years after the pandemi witnessed and suffered by Dr. Semmelweis's patients, namely childbed fever, killing hordes of new mothers and, often, their babies. Wash Your Hands! Dr. Semmelweis exclaimed, to little avail.-The hope is that today, around the world, at this moment, when one is passing and using surely one of millions of hand sanitizers, a thought can possibly go out to Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis and a fuller understanding, and appreciation, of his life and work. Thank you, Anthony Valerio 20/20"

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9780990467519

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To be sure, Semmelweis was a pioneering physician and scientist whose accomplishments should be studied for their contributions to science. But he was also a feminist, and his work should be understood in that vein, also. --Ellen Nerenberg, Hollis Professor of Romance Languages & Literatures, Wesleyan University Readers feel like they are with Semmelweis in the hospital wards where women are dying mysteriously of puerperal fever. We feel with him as he hunts down the cause of the disease with observation and deductive reasoning. We share the exhilarating joy of discovering the cause and then, once the establishment resists the findings, and rejects the easy prevention of the disease, Semmelweis's initial outrage and anger-- ---Eric Goldman, professor, University of Connecticut Read this book, men and women alike. It is one of Valerio's best. --Rebecca West, emeritus, University of Chicago

Author Information

Anthony Valerio is an author, book editor and university professor. He has published ten books of fiction & nonfiction Mr. Valerio has taught at New York University, The City University of New York and Wesleyan University. He was a fiction judge on the PEN Prison Writing Committee. He is a member of The Authors League.

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