May 10 in Medical History
26 entries: discoveries, epidemics, drugs and the people who shaped medicine.
Observed today
- Christian feast day: — Damien of Molokai
Events
- First appendectomy performed in North America by Abraham Groves in Canada
- Hong Kong government declares port is infected with the plague. The outbreak will go on to kill 20,489 over 29 years.
- Gas Mask InventedCanadian physician Cluny Macpherson first presents his gas mask invention to the British War Office
- Film & TV HistoryBruce Lee collapses in Golden Harvest studios in Hong Kong and is rushed to Hong Kong Baptist Hospital where doctors diagnose him with cerebral edema
- Kate Gosselin gives birth to sextuplets in Hershey, Pennsylvania
- The Red Cross suspends all humanitarian work in Pakistan after a worker was kidnapped and killed
- Indian fertility clinic announces that a 70-year-old woman has successfully given birth to a baby boy
- Global confirmed cases of COVID-19 rise above 4 million with death toll above 270,000, according to Johns Hopkins
- US FDA authorizes the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for 12-to-15-year-olds
- World Health Organization classifies the Indian COVID-19 variant B.1.617 as a variant of global concern
- US reports highest rate of gun-related deaths in 24 years in 2020, according to the CDC, with firearm homicides increasing 35% to 6.1 deaths per 100,000 people nationwide
- First children born in the UK with DNA from three people, using mitochondrial replacement therapy (MRT) - in attempt to prevent baby from inheriting mitochondrial DNA mutations
- First draft of a human ‘pangenome’ published, with DNA from 47 people, including from Africa, the Americas, Asia and Europe in effort to capture entirety of human genetic variation, "like going from black-and-white television to 1080p”
Born on this day
- Peter LichtenthalAustrian composer, musicologist, and physician, born in Pressburg, Kingdom of Hungary (d. 1853)
- Hendrik ZwaardemakerDutch physiologist (invented the olfactometer), born in Haarlem, Netherlands (d. 1930)
- Margot TurnerBritish nurse and nursing administrator (whose account as a prisoner-of-war in Japanese camp inspired TV series "Tenko"), born in Finchley, England (d. 1993)
- Dr. T Berry BrazeltonAmerican child development paediatrician, author, TV host (What Every Baby Knows), who developed the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS), born in Waco, Texas (d. 2018)
- Duncan WatsonBritish solicitor and disability activist (President of World Blind Union, 1988-92), born in Sunderland, England (d. 2015)
- Yvette Fay Francis-McBarnetteJamaican-American pediatrician and co-founder of the Foundation for Research and Education in Sickle Cell Disease, born in Kingston, Jamaica (d. 2016)
- Trevor ClayBritish nurse and former Royal College of Nursing General Secretary, born in Warwickshire, England (d. 1994)
- Wayne DyerAmerican psychologist and author (Your Erroneous Zones; Universe Within You), born in Detroit, Michigan (d. 2015)
- Lauren PotterAmerican actress (Glee - "Becky"), and advocate for development disability support (Best Buddies; National Down Syndrome Society; Special Olympics), born in Inland Empire, California
Died on this day
- Leonhard FuchsGerman physician and botanist (Notable Commentaries on the History of Plants) for which the flowering plants and color Fuchsia is named after, dies at 65
- William WatsonEnglish physician and scientist, dies at 72
- Thomas YoungBritish physician and physicist (light interference), dies at 55