Who discovered vaccine for leprosy?

Venezuelan scientist and doctor Jacinto Convit, renowned for developing a vaccine against leprosy, has died at the age of 100. His family said the centenarian had dedicated his life to humanity via medicine. Convit also discovered a vaccine against the tropical skin disease leishmaniasis.

Why is Jacinto Convit famous?

Jacinto Convit García (11 September 1913 – 12 May 2014) was a Venezuelan physician and scientist, known for developing a vaccine to prevent leprosy and his studies to treat cancer. He played a role in founding Venezuela’s National Institute of Biomedicine and held many leprosy-related positions.

Why is Jacinto Convit García a national hero in Venezuela?

With a career spanning more than 70 years, Jacinto Convit García, a leading figure in the fields of public health and tropical diseases, is lauded worldwide-but especially in his native Venezuela, where he is a considered a national hero-for his contributions to the understanding of leprosy, leishmaniasis, parasitology …

How did Jacinto Convit make the world a better place?

In 1987, Convit combined existing tuberculosis treatment and a bacteria found in armadillos to design a new vaccination against leprosy that became used worldwide. Leprosy is a chronic infectious disease causing disfiguring skin ulcers and nerve damage in the arms and legs.

How did leprosy start?

The disease seems to have originated in Eastern Africa or the Near East and spread with successive human migrations. Europeans or North Africans introduced leprosy into West Africa and the Americas within the past 500 years.

Why is there no more leprosy?

Leprosy, also called Hansen’s disease, is a contagious disease. One way it spreads is from person to person. Even so, it’s actually hard to catch. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), about 95% of humans are immune to the bacteria that cause this disease1.

When was leprosy vaccine invented?

New York: The world’s only exclusive vaccine against leprosy was developed in India in the early 1970s. But the country continues to report 60 per cent of leprosy cases across the world today. Also known as Hansen’s disease, leprosy is caused by bacteria called Mycobacterium leprae (M. leprae).

Where does the name Venezuela come from?

In 1498 Christopher Columbus sighted it; European explorers named the region Venezuela (Spanish: “Little Venice”) after observing local Indian houses on stilts along the shores of Lake Maracaibo. A Spanish missionary established the first European settlement at Cumana c. 1523.

Was Francisco Franco a conservative or a Liberal?

As a conservative and a monarchist, Franco opposed the abolition of the monarchy and the establishment of a democratic secular republic in 1931. With the 1936 elections, the conservative Spanish Confederation of Autonomous Right-wing Groups lost by a narrow margin, and the leftist Popular Front came to power.

Why was Francisco Franco not part of the Axis?

Other historians argue that Franco, as the leader of a destroyed and bankrupt country in chaos following a brutal three-year civil war, simply had little to offer the Axis and that the Spanish armed forces were not ready for a major war.

What was the Spanish government’s stance on religion under Francisco Franco?

While under the leadership of Francisco Franco, the Spanish government explicitly endorsed the Catholic Church as the religion of the nation state and did not endorse liberal ideas such as religious pluralism or separation of Church and State found in the Republican Constitution of 1931.