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Lot #330
Albert Sabin

Sabin observes the state of medicine in China

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Estimate: $800+
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Description

Sabin observes the state of medicine in China

American medical researcher (1906-1993) best known for developing a practical oral polio vaccine. AMS, signed on a title sheet, "Albert B. Sabin," 14 pages, 8.5 x 11, circa 1980. A fascinating draft for an article or speech entitled "China, 1980: The Third Revolution in the Struggle for a Better Life." Sabin observes the need for China to provide health benefits and medicine to its citizens. He writes in great detail on the medical situation in China: “In 1980, thirty-one years after the first revolution in the struggle for a better life, China is still by its own evolution an economically highly undeveloped country…The people were plagued by all the nutritional and infectious diseases that are a consequence of extreme poverty everywhere in the world. Vitamin deficiency diseases such as beri beri, pellagra, scurvy, osteomalacea, etc. were widespread, but just plain starvation (undernutrition rather malnutrition) was also widespread. Tuberculosis, typhoid, cholera, typhus, bacterial meningitis, leprosy, smallpox, and frachoma affected a large part of the population. Parasitic diseases such as hoodworm (aneylostomiasis), sohistomiasis, filariasis, clonorchiasis, malaria, etc. added their share of misery. Venereal diseases and opium smoking were common. About 200 of every 1,000 live born children died during the first years of life…The extraordinary poverty of most of the population was all the more cruel of the affluence of a small number of Chinese businessmen and landlords."

Sabin continues with many other warnings, and concludes: "I cannot finish this article without mentioning the astonishment of every foreign visitor to China, namely extraordinary honesty of the population—hotel rooms are not locked and there is not fear of thieves or robberies. China’s current efforts are entirely directed to providing a better life for its own population which now is more than one fifth of the total population of the world. All compassionate people—and I am one—can only say 'Good luck China!'" In fine condition. A lengthy, thoughtful piece by the renowned medical scientist.

Auction Info

  • Auction Title: Fine Autographs and Artifacts
  • Dates: #531 - Ended July 11, 2018





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