Exploring the History of Medicine by John Hudson Tiner

Author:John Hudson Tiner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: RELIGION / Christian Education / Children & Youth
ISBN: 978-1-61458-151-2
Publisher: New Leaf Publishing Group, Inc.
Published: 2014-02-19T00:00:00+00:00

Silk growers asked Pasteur to find out why their silkworms were dying. Pasteur discovered by using his microscope that micro-organisms were growing not only on the pepper spots on the silkworms but also on the mulberry leaves. His solution was to burn the infected worms and leaves and start with healthy silkworms and new mulberry bushes. After they followed Pasteur's instructions, the silkworms were able to survive.

Louis Pasteur could not shake the thought: if microbes can cause disease in silkworms, then microbes might cause disease in humans, too.

Doctors violently disagreed. “Pasteur is a quack. We need no outsider to tell us how to run our affairs. Leave medicine in the hands of those who have been trained in healing!”

“Microbes are killers,” Louis said. He begged doctors to steam their bandages, to boil their surgical instruments, to wash their hands before going from patient to patient. Such steps would kill microbes and prevent diseases.

Yet, because he held no medical degree, doctors ignored his pleas. “There is no connection between the death of silkworms and the diseases of people.”

Louis Pasteur attended a medical meeting. A doctor talked about childbed fever. He described atmospheric conditions as the cause. Louis stood up and interrupted. “The cause of the epidemic is nothing of the kind. It is the doctor and his staff who carry the microbe from a sick woman to a healthy woman.”

He went up to the blackboard and drew a picture of the microbe. “There! That is what it is like.”

During his own lecture, Louis Pasteur turned on a lantern that sent a beam of light across the lecture hall. “Observe the thousands of dancing specks of dust in the path of this ray,” he cried. “The air of this hall is filled with these specks of dust on which microbes are carried.”

Pasteur’s germ theory of disease was probably the single most important medical discovery of all time. It answered many questions that didn’t have a solution otherwise. It explained the success of Dr. Semmelweiss in preventing infection.

Louis Pasteur received many honors from his native France. Some scientists resented his fame. They claimed his success was only the result of good luck.

“Good luck favors the prepared mind,” Louis pointed out. One of the ways he prepared his mind was a devotion each morning. He read the Bible and prayed before going about each day’s activity.

He’d already earned enough fame for a dozen people. He was probably the most dedicated scientist of all time. Well, why not? “Science is an enchantment,” Louis Pasteur said. “It’s not work when it is fun!”

Then at the crest of his fame, a tragedy struck. Louis suffered a stroke that paralyzed his left side. It threatened his life. He was 46 years old. Because of the stroke, most people believed his scientific career was over. Louis Pasteur would not allow tragedy to easily defeat him. We’ll see how it turned out in a later chapter.

DIAGNOSES

1. Louis Pasteur's discovery of pasteurization helped keep products from spoiling.

2. He believed all living things must come from living things, rejecting Darwin's evolution.

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