January 13: Sławomir Łotysz at Socialist Medicine Seminar
Sławomir Łotysz (Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw) presents:
POLISH MEDICINE IN THE KOREAN WAR
January 13, 14:00-16:00 CET
Humboldt University of Berlin
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During the Korean War (1950–53), Poland sided with the communist aggressors from the North. Much of the aid provided to North Korea was intended to alleviate the health crisis resulting from the war. In addition to delivering drugs and medical equipment, Poland sent a fully staffed field hospital. After the armistice, this hospital became a civilian hospital with an attached medical academy, where Polish doctors lectured. Another way in which Polish medicine alleviated the suffering caused by the war was by caring for over a thousand Korean orphans, whose health was in a terrible state when they arrived in Poland. This posed a real challenge as they carried various infections and parasitic infestations that were unfamiliar to Polish medicine, which had little experience of tropical diseases up to that point. Another aspect of Polish medicine's involvement in the Korean War is its endorsement of the false allegation that the United States had used biological weapons. All of these aspects were widely present in the Polish media, from radio and newspapers to literature and theatre, which were heavily exploited by communist propaganda. In this lecture, Łotysz will outline the scope and nature of Polish medical aid to North Korea and how it was represented in the media. Łotysz will discuss how this episode is embedded within a broader context of the globalisation of socialist healthcare and medicine.
SŁAWOMIR ŁOTYSZ is a professor at the Institute for the History of Science of the Polish Academy of Sciences since 2014. He has been an Andrew Mellon Fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies in Wassenaar in 2014–15, and Charles Price Fellow at the Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia in 2007–08. He was the President of the International Committee for the History of Technology in 2017–21, and a member of SHOT Nominating Committee in 2021-23. He is currently a project leader on an international research project entitled ‘Media and Epidemics: Technologies of Science Communication and Public Health in the 20th and 21st Centuries” (MEDEP).
January 13: Sławomir Łotysz at Socialist Medicine Seminar
Sławomir Łotysz (Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw) presents:
POLISH MEDICINE IN THE KOREAN WAR
January 13, 14:00-16:00 CET
Humboldt University of Berlin
Sign up for the Zoom link by clicking here and filling out this form.
During the Korean War (1950–53), Poland sided with the communist aggressors from the North. Much of the aid provided to North Korea was intended to alleviate the health crisis resulting from the war. In addition to delivering drugs and medical equipment, Poland sent a fully staffed field hospital. After the armistice, this hospital became a civilian hospital with an attached medical academy, where Polish doctors lectured. Another way in which Polish medicine alleviated the suffering caused by the war was by caring for over a thousand Korean orphans, whose health was in a terrible state when they arrived in Poland. This posed a real challenge as they carried various infections and parasitic infestations that were unfamiliar to Polish medicine, which had little experience of tropical diseases up to that point. Another aspect of Polish medicine's involvement in the Korean War is its endorsement of the false allegation that the United States had used biological weapons. All of these aspects were widely present in the Polish media, from radio and newspapers to literature and theatre, which were heavily exploited by communist propaganda. In this lecture, Łotysz will outline the scope and nature of Polish medical aid to North Korea and how it was represented in the media. Łotysz will discuss how this episode is embedded within a broader context of the globalisation of socialist healthcare and medicine.
SŁAWOMIR ŁOTYSZ is a professor at the Institute for the History of Science of the Polish Academy of Sciences since 2014. He has been an Andrew Mellon Fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies in Wassenaar in 2014–15, and Charles Price Fellow at the Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia in 2007–08. He was the President of the International Committee for the History of Technology in 2017–21, and a member of SHOT Nominating Committee in 2021-23. He is currently a project leader on an international research project entitled ‘Media and Epidemics: Technologies of Science Communication and Public Health in the 20th and 21st Centuries” (MEDEP).
