London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine is a division of the University of London.

In 1899, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, headed by Sir Patrick Manson, now known as the father of tropical medicine, opened its door.

Born in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, on the 3rd October 1844, the son of a banker, he was educated at Aberdeen and Edinburgh, completing his medical degree before the age of 21. Patrick Manson had served as medical officer in Formosa, Amoy and Hong Kong.

He return to England in the 1890s and began lectures in Tropical medicine at Livingston College.

Sir Patrick Manson was instrumental in showing that malaria was transmitted by mosquitoes.

His work on ‘Mosquito Manson’ in China in the 1870s and his manual on Tropical Diseases in 1898 led to great advances in the control of malaria and yellow fever.

When he was appointed medical adviser to the Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1897, he urged Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain to create specializing in tropical medicine.

He used his position and his energy to establish, in conjunction with the Seaman’s Hospital on the Lower Thames, the London School of Tropical Medicine and on the 3rd October 1899 on Manson’s birthday the first class met.

In 1924, the Rockefeller Foundation donated $2,000,000 band the school was renamed London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

After five years of planning and building, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine opened officially on July 18 1929, and it was here that the ultimate stage of epidemiological science consolidated its twentieth-century concern with diseases beyond the obvious infectious ones, now rapidly coming under control.

The first director was Sir Andrew Balfour who had for nearly twenty years directed the research in tropical medicine sponsored by Henry Wellcome. The school is now located in 35 acre tract near the British Museum.
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine