1920 | Medicine
Medicine
The Rockefeller Institute assigns Winchester, Mass.-born medical researcher Louise Pearce, 35, to a team that goes to Leopoldville in the Belgian Congo to conduct scientific tests of a compound (it will become known as tryparsmiva) isolated last year by Pearce and her colleague Wade Hampton Brown. Endemic in the Congo, sleeping sickness inflames the brain and keeps the victim in a state of constant drowsiness, and researchers have isolated the cause of the disease in a microscopic parasite transmitted by the bite of the tsetse fly. Pearce and Brown's compound effectively destroys the parasite in test animals; they conduct a scientifically planned program to determine the efficacy of tryparsmiva, and within weeks even victims of the most severe cases are cured and the effects of sleeping sickness reversed. Pearce's work will save tens of thousands of lives (and make Congo workers far more productive) by eradicating the disease; she is awarded the Order of the Crown of Belgium and will receive the $10,000 King Leopold II prize in 1953.
Microbiologist Dmitri Ivanovski dies at Rostov June 20 at age 55, having pioneered the study of viruses; former U.S. Army surgeon general William C. Gorgas dies at London July 3 at age 65. He played a major role in eliminating yellow fever and retired 2 years ago with the rank of major general.