We are proud to announce the promotion of the Serbian edition of Ludwik Hirszfeld’s autobiography.
The Polish Embassy in Belgrade was honoured to participate in the presentation of the book ‘Ludwik Hirszfeld – Istorija jednoga života’, which took place on 20 February at the Serbian Literary Bookshop.
This remarkable autobiography of the eminent Polish physician and scientist, who dedicated himself to helping Serbia during the typhoid epidemic of 1915, was published thanks to the support of the Embassy and the Association ‘Valjevska bolnica 1914-1915’ from Valjevo (Valjevo 1914-1915. godine – grad bolnica).
Jacek Multanowski (deputy director of the Polish Institute in Belgrade), Velibor Vidić (president of the Association ‘Valjevska bolnica 1914-1915’) and Nikola Marinković (editor-in-chief of the Serbian Literary Bookshop) spoke at the event, highlighting both Hirszfeld’s scientific achievements and his extraordinary dedication to humanity and Serbia and his contribution to science and humanism.
Link to the event: https://www.facebook.com/PolishEmbassySerbia/posts/pfbid0HhTK6kp3nHdrkZ7zc4GCG3mop2K5azSLQgtvy9UTAm6jQYe4BHDLHSUhhTmmEapTl?locale=pl_PL
Reminder: more than 50,000 wounded Serbian soldiers were placed in the Serbian town of Valjevo during the war, many of them suffering from typhoid fever. The epidemic was spreading throughout the country. Hirszfeld therefore decided to go to Serbia and fight the epidemic. To fight typhus, he used sulphur, which was used to disinfect all dwellings and objects in the city, thus suppressing the epidemic. He then opened a bacteriological laboratory in exile. The vaccine he produced against strains of typhoid and cholera was administered to more than 110,000 soldiers.
Streets in the capital Belgrade and the southern Serbian city of Niš are named after the great Pole. Wreaths are laid at his monument in the capital every year on 24 September, a day of remembrance for foreign doctors active in Serbia during the Balkan Wars and the First World War. The Serbian Post issued special stamps ‘100 years since the end of the Great War – Great Doctors of the Great War’, one of which was dedicated to Hirszfeld.
One of the restaurateurs from Valjevo decided not to take payment from the Poles who are hosted in his establishment.