|
Today’s
Doodle celebrates the 142nd birthday of Chinese-Malaysian
epidemiologist Dr. Wu Lien-teh, who invented a surgical face
covering that is widely considered the precursor to the N95 mask.
Born into a family of Chinese immigrants in Penang, Malaya
(modern-day Malaysia) on this day in 1879, Wu went on to become the
first student of Chinese descent to earn his MD from Cambridge
University. Following his doctoral studies, he accepted a position
as the vice director for China's Imperial Army Medical College in
1908. When an unknown epidemic afflicted north-western China in
1910, the Chinese government appointed Wu to investigate the
disease, which he identified as the highly contagious pneumonic
plague that spread from human to human through respiratory
transmission.
To combat the disease, Wu designed and produced a special surgical
mask with cotton and gauze, adding several layers of cloth to filter
inhalations. He advised people to wear his newly invented mask and
worked with government officials to establish quarantine stations
and hospitals, restrict travel, and apply progressive sterilization
techniques; his leadership contributed greatly to the end of the
pandemic (known as the Manchurian plague) by April 1911—within four
months of being tasked with controlling its spread.
In 1915, Wu founded the Chinese Medical Association, the country’s
largest and oldest non-governmental medical organization. In 1935,
he was the first Malaysian—and the first person of Chinese
descent–nominated for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for
his work to control the pneumonic plague. A devoted advocate and
practitioner of medical advancement, Wu’s efforts not only changed
public health in China but that of the entire world.
Happy birthday to the man behind the mask, Dr. Wu Lien-teh!
|
