R.I.P. Bernard Lown
Posted: Thu Feb 18, 2021 5:09 pmA bit specialist, maybe, but one of the great physicicans of the 20th century has left us, at age 99. Bernard Lown did groundbreaking scientific work on the conducting system of the heart, culminating in the development of the defibrllator and the synchronized cardioverter.
Even more importantly, Lown founded the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), with his Soviet colleague, Evgeny Ivanovich Chasov. The thinking was, since nuclear war is obviously the worst health risk human society could possibly face, physicians should initiate some prevention. They were seen with a critical eye, because obiviously, Soviet physicians joined in the effort with permission and support from high up, so there was always the suspicion that the Western doctors made themselves the useful idiots of Soviet "anti-war" (read: Anti-Western) propaganda. But in the times of Glasnost and Perestroika, matters took a more favourable course, and the two founders jointly received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985.
Most importantly to me, Bernard Lown was an exemplary personality as a physician, with exactly the mixture of science-oriented professionalism, and a warm, caring heart that one should have for the job. If you want to meet my personal role model on how to be a doctor, look no further than his "The Lost Art of Healing", available at modest cost in well-sorted bookstores. During my fat-cat years, I always had few copies of it in my office, to be inscribed with a quick handwritten dedication when a gift for someone was needed.
Here's to life truly well lived.
Even more importantly, Lown founded the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), with his Soviet colleague, Evgeny Ivanovich Chasov. The thinking was, since nuclear war is obviously the worst health risk human society could possibly face, physicians should initiate some prevention. They were seen with a critical eye, because obiviously, Soviet physicians joined in the effort with permission and support from high up, so there was always the suspicion that the Western doctors made themselves the useful idiots of Soviet "anti-war" (read: Anti-Western) propaganda. But in the times of Glasnost and Perestroika, matters took a more favourable course, and the two founders jointly received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985.
Most importantly to me, Bernard Lown was an exemplary personality as a physician, with exactly the mixture of science-oriented professionalism, and a warm, caring heart that one should have for the job. If you want to meet my personal role model on how to be a doctor, look no further than his "The Lost Art of Healing", available at modest cost in well-sorted bookstores. During my fat-cat years, I always had few copies of it in my office, to be inscribed with a quick handwritten dedication when a gift for someone was needed.
Here's to life truly well lived.