Friday, August 8, 2014

Aaron Leroy Alston - first in world to get shot of penicillin

Read a fascinating post all about the fact that the first person ever to receive a shot of the new wonder drug penicillin was not white and wealthy but rather black and working class.

That would be amazing even today - but in 1940 ?!

It was like a red flag to a bull to right wing Americans determined to see that dying Americans didn't get any medical care unless they or their family could pay for it.

Louise Glaze Alston


Bravo to Doctor Dawson and Aaron Leroy Alston and to his marvellous mom, Mrs Louise L (nee Glaze) Alston, second oldest child in a family of 11 kids and so probably a stand-in for mother long before she had kids.

I an the second oldest girl in a poor family of 14 so I speak from experience !