Richard Pearson Strong (1872–1948) was a

tropical medicine Tropical medicine is an interdisciplinary branch of medicine that deals with health issues that occur uniquely, are more widespread, or are more difficult to control in tropical and subtropical regions. Physicians in this field diagnose and tr ...

professor at Harvard who did significant work on plague,

cholera Cholera () is an infection of the small intestine by some Strain (biology), strains of the Bacteria, bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea last ...

bacillary dysentery Bacillary dysentery is a type of dysentery, and is a severe form of shigellosis. It is associated with species of bacteria from the family Enterobacteriaceae. The term is usually restricted to ''Shigella'' infections. Shigellosis is caused by one ...

and other diseases. He was the first professor of tropical medicine at Harvard, where he critically infected 24 unknowing victims with cholera, causing 13 of their deaths. His department was eventually incorporated into the

Harvard School of Public Health The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health is the public health school at Harvard University, located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. It was named after Hong Kong entrepreneur Chan Tseng-hsi in 2014 following a US$350 ...

, founded in 1922. From 1926 to 1927 he led the Harvard Medical African Expedition and wrote the book ''The African Republic of Liberia and the Belgian Congo: Based on the Observations Made and Material Collected during the Harvard African Expedition, 1926-1927'' in partnership with other Expedition members and Harvard officials.

Biography

Richard P. Strong was born in

Fort Monroe, Virginia Fort Monroe is a former military installation in Hampton, Virginia, at Old Point Comfort, the southern tip of the Virginia Peninsula, United States. It is currently managed by partnership between the Fort Monroe Authority for the Commonwealth ...

on March 18, 1872. He was educated at the

Hopkins School Hopkins School is a private, college-preparatory, coeducational, day school for grades 7–12 located in New Haven, Connecticut. In 1660, Edward Hopkins, seven-time governor of the Connecticut Colony, bequeathed a portion of his estate to fou ...

, graduated from

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

in 1893, and earned his medical degree at

Johns Hopkins University The Johns Hopkins University (often abbreviated as Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1876 based on the European research institution model, J ...

in 1897. He married Agnes Leas on January 1, 1916. He died in Boston on July 4, 1948.

Bilibid vaccine trials

Strong, while the head of the Bureau of Laboratories in

Manila Manila, officially the City of Manila, is the Capital of the Philippines, capital and second-most populous city of the Philippines after Quezon City, with a population of 1,846,513 people in 2020. Located on the eastern shore of Manila Bay on ...

, carried out

vaccine trial A vaccine trial is a clinical trial that aims at establishing the safety and efficacy of a vaccine prior to it being licensed. A vaccine candidate drug is first identified through preclinical evaluations that could involve high throughput scr ...

s at the

Philippine The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

Bilibid Prison The New Bilibid Prison (NBP) in Muntinlupa, Metro Manila, is the main insular prison designed to house the prison population of the Philippines. It is maintained by the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) under the Department of Justice (DOJ). As ...

. During one of the experimental trials in 1906, twenty-four prisoners were injected, without their consent, with a

vaccine that was contaminated with

bubonic plague Bubonic plague is one of three types of Plague (disease), plague caused by the Bacteria, bacterium ''Yersinia pestis''. One to seven days after exposure to the bacteria, flu-like symptoms develop. These symptoms include fever, headaches, and ...

. The prisoners contracted bubonic plague, and 13 died.

Sources

* ''Harvard Public Health Alumni Bulletin'', November 1948, pp. 43–44. * "Deaths". ''JAMA'' 1948; 138 (4)
Richard P. Strong Papers
at th
Countway repository
of the

Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area, Longwood Medical Area in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is the third oldest medical school in the Un ...

. Includes images of R.P. Strong
1924 on Amazonc.1930s in Serbia1934 with the Harvard African Expedition
*

External links

Richard P. Strong Papers, 1911-2004 (inclusive), 1911-1945 (bulk). GA 82. Harvard Medical Library, Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Boston, Mass.
American tropical physicians 1872 births 1948 deaths Hopkins School alumni Johns Hopkins School of Medicine alumni Yale University alumni Presidents of the American Society of Parasitologists {{US-physician-stub