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  • Article

The father of handwashing

Doctors performing autopsies and then delivering babies – with not a hint of soap in between – was the grim recipe producing a lot of motherless offspring in the 1800s. But one man’s gargantuan efforts to upend accepted medical thinking turned the tide.

  • Article

The case of the cancerous stomach

Steak and schnitzel were on the menu again after Theodor Billroth successfully excised a woman’s stomach cancer in 1881. Remarkably, today’s surgeons still perform the same procedure, with slight modifications.

  • Long read

Healthy scepticism

Healthcare sceptics – like those opposed to Covid-19 vaccinations – often have serious, nuanced reasons for doubting medical authorities.

  • Article

What is structural violence?

Structural violence is seemingly invisible. But its tentacles have invaded every part of many people’s lives, thoughts, experiences and expectations, shaping them in ways they don’t even realise.

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Images

  • The Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine.
  • The Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine Calf Lymph chloroform process.
  • The Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine Calf Lymph in metal tubes.
  • Report of Parade and Mass Meeting at Pimlico to Protest Against the Erection of the British Institute of Preventive Medicine
  • SA/LIS/L.63, Basement plan of the Lister Ins
  • SA/LIS/L.63, third floor plan of the Lister
  • SA/LIS/L.63, fourth floor plan of the Lister
  • SA/LIS/L.63, 1/8 scale plan of the Lister In
  • SA.LIS/L.63, Ground floor plan of the Lister
  • SA/LIS/L.63, second floor plan of the Lister
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