May 8 in Medical History
22 entries: discoveries, epidemics, drugs and the people who shaped medicine.
Observed today
- World Red Cross and Red Crescent Day (International)
Events
- Jockey Ralph Neves unexpectedly revived after being declared dead after a fall. His wife faints when he returns to the track.
- World Health Organization announces smallpox has been eradicated
- Ebola outbreak declared in north-west Democratic Republic of Congo with 2 confirmed cases and 17 deaths
- Governor of Georgia Brian Kemp signs new abortion law, the so-called "heart-beat bill" (comes into effect Jan 2020)
- British 17-year-old Isabelle Holdaway is reported to be the first patient ever to receive a genetically modified phage therapy to treat a drug-resistant infection.
- Two US White House staffers test positive for COVID-19 and three members of the coronavirus task force go into self-isolation after possible exposure to the virus
- Indian Medical Association calls for a national lockdown, criticizing President Modi's government's response as recorded COVID-19 deaths pass 4,000 a day
Born on this day
- Samuel Leonard TilleyCanadian pharmacist and politician, 3rd Premier of New Brunswick (died 1896)
- William WalkerAmerican physician and president of Nicaragua (1856-57), born in Nashville, Tennessee (d. 1860)
- Henry DunantSwiss humanitarian and co-founder of the Red Cross (Nobel Peace Prize 1901), born in Geneva, Switzerland (1828-1910)
- Andre Michel LwoffFrench physiologist (1965 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discoveries of genetic control of enzyme and virus synthesis), born in Ainay-le-Château, France (d. 1994)
- Claude CastonguayQuebec politician (task force on Quebec health care), born in Quebec City (d. 2020)
- Robert H. BartlettAmerican surgeon who developed extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO machines), born in Ann Arbor, Michigan (d. 2025)
- H. Robert HorvitzAmerican biologist (Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2002 for"genetic regulation of organ development and programmed cell death"), born in Chicago, Illinois
- Devi ShettyIndian surgeon and health entrepreneur (Narayana Health), born in Dakshina Kannada, India
- Clemens LothallerAustrian physician cosmonaut (Soyuz TM-13 backup), born in Vienna, Austria
Died on this day
- Catherine of St. AugustineFrench-Canadian nun and saint (born 1632)
- Giovanni Antonio ScopoliItalian-Austrian physician and naturalist interested in entomology (Entomologia Carniolica), dies at 64
- Vital BrazilBrazilian physician (b. 1865)
- Henry NicolsAmerican AIDS activist, dies as the result of a car accident at 26
- Monty LosowskyBritish physician and medical educator (St. James University Hospital in Leeds, 1962-96), dies at 88