Almroth Wright

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Sir Almroth Wright
Farnham Common, Buckinghamshire, England
Alma materTrinity College Dublin
Known forvaccination through the use of autogenous vaccines
AwardsBuchanan Medal (1917)
Fellow of the Royal Society[1]
Scientific career
Fieldsbacteriology
immunology
InstitutionsNetley Hospital
St Mary's Hospital, London

Sir Almroth Edward Wright

immunologist.[2]

He is notable for developing a system of anti-

preventive medicine
.

Biography

Wright was born at

Protestant Reformation Society.[4] His mother, Ebba Almroth, was the daughter of Nils Wilhelm Almroth [sv], Governor of the Swedish Royal Mint in Stockholm.[5] His younger brother Charles Theodore Hagberg Wright became the librarian of the London Library
.

In 1882, he graduated from Trinity College Dublin with first-class honours in modern literature and won a gold medal in modern languages and literature.[6]: 2  Simultaneously he took medicine courses and in 1883 graduated in medicine.[1][6]: 3  In the late 19th century, Wright worked with the armed forces of Britain to develop vaccines and promote immunisation.

He married Jane Georgina Wilson (1861-1926) [3] in 1889 and had three children. The first, Edward Robert Mackay Wright (1890-1913), was born in Glebe, Sydney. Second son Leonard Almoth Wilson Wright (1891-1972) was born in Dublin, as was daughter Doris Helena MacNaughton Wright (later Romanes, after whom the Helena Romanes School was named) (1894-1990).[7]

In 1902, Wright started a research department at

Sir Alexander Fleming, who in turn later discovered lysozyme and penicillin. Wright was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in May 1906.[10] Leonard Colebrook became his assistant in 1907 and continued working with him until 1929.[11]

Wright warned early on that

preventive medicine influential, stressing preventive measures. Wright's ideas have been re-asserted recently—70 years after his death—by modern researchers in articles in such periodicals as Scientific American. He also argued that microorganisms are vehicles of disease but not its cause, a theory that earned him the nickname "Almroth Wrong" from his opponents. Another derogatory nickname was "Sir Almost Wright".[12]

He also proposed that logic be introduced as a part of medical training, but his idea was never adopted. Wright also pointed out that Pasteur and Fleming, although both excellent researchers, had not managed to find cures for the diseases for which they had sought cures, but instead had stumbled upon cures for totally unrelated diseases.[citation needed]

Wright was a strong proponent of the

Ascorbic acid, Scorbic meaning Scurvy).[citation needed
]

There is a ward named after him at St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, London.[citation needed]

Women's suffrage

Wright was strongly opposed to women's suffrage. He argued that women's brains were innately different from men's and were not constituted to deal with social and public issues. His arguments were most fully expounded in his book The Unexpurgated Case Against Woman Suffrage (1913). In the book, Wright also vigorously opposes the professional development of women.[14] Rebecca West and May Sinclair both wrote articles criticizing Wright's opposition to women's suffrage.[15][16] Charlotte Perkins Gilman satirized Wright's opposition to women's suffrage in her novel Herland.[14]

Bernard Shaw

Wright was a friend of his fellow Irishman George Bernard Shaw. He was immortalised as Sir Colenso Ridgeon in the play The Doctor's Dilemma written in 1906, which arose from conversations between Shaw and Wright. Shaw credits Wright as the source of his information on medical science: "It will be evident to all experts that my play could not have been written but for the work done by Sir Almroth Wright on the theory and practice of securing immunization from bacterial diseases by the inoculation of vaccines made of their own bacteria."[17] This remark of Shaw's is characteristically ironical. Wright was knighted shortly before the play was written, and Shaw was suspicious of Wright's high reputation (the latter was also known by the nickname Sir Almost Right). The two men met in 1905, and engaged in a long series of robust discussions, involving at one point a challenge from the medical audience that they had "too many patients on our hands already". Shaw's response was to ask what would be done if there was more demand from patients than could be satisfied, and Wright answered: "We should have to consider which life was worth saving." This became the "dilemma" of the play.[18]

Shaw also portrays him in his playlet How These Doctors Love One Another! and uses his theory of bacterial mutation in Too True to Be Good.[12] Shaw, who campaigned for women's suffrage, strongly disagreed with Wright about women's brains and dismissed his views on the subject as absurd.[citation needed]

Awards

Wright had been honoured for his deeds a total of 29 times in his lifetime – a knighthood, 5 honorary doctorates, 5 honorary orders, 6 fellowships (2 honoraries), 4 prizes, 4 memberships, and 3 medals (

Fothergill Gold Medal and a special medal "for the best medical work in connection with the war").[19]: 282  He was nominated 14 times for the Nobel prize from 1906 to 1925.[20]

Works

Wikisource has original works by or about:
Almroth Wright

Wright's work could be split up into the following three phases

  • Early phase (1891–1910) – over 20 medical journal publications, lectures for students and other scientific works
    • Upon a new septic (1891)
    • On the conditions which determine the distribution of the coagulation (1891)
    • A new method of blood transfusion (1891)
    • Grocers' research scholarship lectures (1891)
    • Lecture on tissue- or cell-fibrinogen (1892)
    • On the leucocytes of peptone and other varieties of liquid extravascular blood (1893)
    • On Haffkine's method of vaccination against Asiatic cholera (1893, coauthored with D. Bruce)
    • Remarks on methods of increasing and diminishing the coagulability of the blood (1894)
    • On the association of serious haemorrhages (1896)
    • A suggestion as to the possible cause of the corona observed in certain after images (1897)
    • On the application of the serum test to the differential diagnosis of typhoid and Malta fever (1897)
    • Remarks on vaccination against typhoid fever (1897, coauthored with D. Semple)
    • An experimental investigation on the role of the blood fluids in connection with phagocytosis (1903, coauthored with Stewart Rankin Douglas)
    • On the action exerted upon the tubercle bacillus by human blood fluids (1904, coauthored with Stewart Rankin Douglas)
    • A short treatise on anti-typhoid inoculation (1904)
    • On the possibility of determining the presence or absence of tubercular infection (1906, coauthored with S. T. Reid)
    • On spontaneous phagocytosis (1906, coauthored with S. T. Reid)
    • Studies on immunisation and their application to the diagnosis and treatment of bacterial infections (1909)
    • Vaccine therapy—its administration, value, and limitations (1910)
    • Introduction to vaccine therapy (1920)
  • War phases (1914–1918 and 1941–1945) – mostly works about wounds, wound infections and new perspectives on the topic
    • Wound infections and some new methods (1915)
    • Conditions which govern the growth of the bacillus of "Gas Gangrene" (1917)
    • Pathology and Treatment of War Wounds (1942)
    • Researches in Clinical Physiology (1943)
    • Studies on Immunization (2 vol., 1943–1944)
  • Philosophy phase (1918–1941 and 1945–1947) – more or less philosophic works, including thoughts on logic, equality, science and scientific methods
  • Handbooks
    • Principles of microscopy: being a handbook to the microscope (1906)
    • Technique of the teat and capillary glass tube (1912)

Bibliography

See also

References

  1. ^
    S2CID 161950029
    .
  2. ISBN 0470016175
    .
  3. ^
    doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/37032. (Subscription or UK public library membership
    required.)
  4. ^ "Dr. C. H. H. Wright (obituary)". The Times. 22 March 1909. Archived from the original on 26 March 2016. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  5. ^ Sir Charles Hagberg Wright (obituary) Archived 18 October 2016 at the Wayback Machine. The Times, 7 March 1940.
  6. ^ a b c Cope, Zachary (1966). Almroth Wright: Founder of modern vaccine-therapy. London: Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd.
  7. ^ England and Wales, National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1858-1995 for Almoth Edward Wright
  8. doi:10.1098/rspl.1903.0062
    .
  9. doi:10.1056/nejm191803211781217
    .
  10. ^ "List of Fellows of the Royal Society 1660 – 2007" (PDF). Royal Society: Library and Information Services. 2007. p. 390. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  11. PMID 11615432
    .
  12. ^ a b Sally Peters (2003). Commentary: Bernard Shaw's dilemma: marked by mortality. International Journal of Epidemiology, International Epidemiological Association.
  13. PMID 9290433
    .
  14. ^
    ISBN 0-394-50388-0
    . Retrieved 16 October 2012. I see now clearly enough why a certain kind of man, like Sir Almroth Wright, resents the professional development of women.... 'Sexless, epicene, undeveloped neuters!' he [Terry O'Nicholson] went on bitterly. He sounded like Sir Almwroth Wright.
  15. ^ Bornstein, George (1991). Representing Modernist Texts: Editing as Interpretation. Michigan: University of Michigan Press. p. 74.
  16. ^ Fernihough, Anne (1991). Freewomen and Supermen: Edwardian Radicals and Literary Modernism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 65.
  17. ^ Violet M. Broad & C. Lewis Broad, Dictionary to the Plays and Novels of Bernard Shaw, A. & C. Black, London, 1929, p.41.
  18. ^ Michael Holroyd, The Guardian 13 July 2012, "Bernard Shaw and his lethally absurd doctor's dilemma".
  19. ^ Colebrook, Leonard (1954). Almroth Wright : Proactive doctor and thinker. London: William Heinemann.
  20. ^ "Nomination Archive".
  21. ISBN 1-871408-07-5
    .

External links

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